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#NiUnaMenos
Argentinians formally leave Catholic church over stance on abortion
More than 3,700 people submit apostasy requests in protest against anti-abortion campaign
Sun 9 Sep 2018
Thousands of Argentinians – most of them women – have started formal proceedings to abandon the Catholic church, in protest of the church’s campaign against efforts to legalise abortion in the country.
In the month since the country's senate voted to maintain a ban on almost all abortions, more than 3,700 people have submitted apostasy applications to the Argentinian synod, according to César Rosenstein, a lawyer and founding member of the Argentinian Coalition for a Lay State.
Continued: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/09/argentina-catholic-church-legalize-abortion-apostacy
Argentinian Coalition for a Lay State
César Rosenstein
clandestine abortion
Mothers of Plaza de Mayo
Nora Cortinas
pro-choice campaigners
Soledad Vallejos
Latin America’s Rights Riddle
Why the region says yes to same-sex marriage and no to abortion.
By Omar G. Encarnación
In Latin America, progressive politics present something of a mystery: As LGBT rights have flourished, women’s reproductive rights have floundered. Earlier this month, for example, a bill to legalize abortion in the first 14 weeks of pregnancy was defeated in the Argentine Senate. This is the same body that in 2010 made Argentina the first Latin American country to legalize same-sex marriage with identical rights to heterosexual marriage. And since that historic milestone, Argentina has enacted one of the most liberal laws on gender identity to be found anywhere in the world. Its code allows people to change the gender listed on their legal documents without a diagnosis of gender dysphoria or permission from a judge, as is required in most countries. The country has also granted same-sex couples reproductive rights, such as access to in vitro fertilization under the national health plan, and has banned programs that aim to “cure” same-sex attraction.
Continued: https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/08/27/latin-americas-rights-riddle/?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_todayworld
Argentine Conference of Bishops
Breaking the Silence: Human Rights Violations Based on Sexual Orientation
Fernando Laborda
Gabriela Michetti
International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission
Outright Action International
Pedro Guastavino
pinkwashing
President Mauricio Macri
total abortion ban
Despite law’s defeat, women fight on for abortion rights in Argentina
By Kathleen Durkin
Women in Argentina may have lost a vote for the right to abortion on Aug. 9, but they are undaunted. They are not intimidated or afraid. They are angry. They are determined. They are optimistic. With renewed energy, they say they will keep on organizing until they win this fundamental right.
The current struggle is for legalization of elective abortions up to the 14th week of pregnancy; 62 percent of the population supports reform. The lower house of the Argentinian Congress had passed such a law on June 14, in response to the mass movement. However, the more conservative Senate narrowly defeated legalization on Aug. 9 with a 38-31 vote; two senators abstained. The majority of “no” votes were cast by men over the age of 50.
Continued: https://www.workers.org/2018/08/26/despite-laws-defeat-women-fight-on-for-abortion-rights-in-argentina/
Catholic Church atrocities
Network of Health Professionals for the Right to Decide
pro-choice momentum
state femicide
This is why Argentina did not legalize abortion this week
by Julia María Rubio
After months of debates and a close favorable vote by the Argentine House in June, the Argentine Senate has voted down a bill that would have legalized abortion. Despite House support and a large feminist mobilization on behalf of the bill, the Senate — which over-represents the votes of rural and conservative constituencies — rejected the bill, 38 to 31.
Here are five things to know about the politics of legalizing abortion in Argentina.
Continued: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2018/08/11/this-is-why-argentina-did-not-legalize-abortion-this-week/?utm_term=.6f4229f49515
#SalvemosLasDosVidas
Argentine Senate
Chiara Paez
decriminalization of abortion
Juliana Di Tullio
La Campaña
malapportionment
Save the Two Lives
They Lost Argentina’s Abortion Vote, but Advocates Started a Movement
By Daniel Politi and Ernesto Londoño
BUENOS AIRES — They narrowly lost the vote. But as supporters of a bill to legalize abortion in Argentina began to shake off a stinging defeat in the Senate on Thursday, they took consolation in having galvanized a reproductive-rights movement across Latin America and began to consider how to redirect their activism.
A coalition of young female lawmakers who stunned the political establishment by putting abortion rights at the top of the legislative agenda this year seemed to be on the verge of a historic victory with the bill. But intense lobbying by Catholic Church leaders and staunch opposition in conservative northern provinces persuaded enough senators to vote against it.
Continued: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/09/world/americas/argentina-abortion-laws-south-america.html
abortion rights activists
Benjamin Gedan
Center for Legal and Social Studies
Center for the Promotion and Defense of Sexual and Reproductive Rights
Center for the Study of State and Society
Debora Diniz
Edurne Cárdenas
Françoise Girard
green handkerchiefs
International Women's Health Coalition
Jimena Del Potro
Mara Castillo
Marcela Ojeda
Mariana Romero
Susana Chávez
Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars
Author Margaret Atwood tells Argentina’s VP: ‘Give women the right to choose abortion’
Author Margaret Atwood tells Argentina's VP: 'Give women the right to choose abortion'
Atwood addressed Gabriella Michetti following accusations last week that the vice-president was trying to hinder a vote in the Senate on the bill to decriminalise elective abortion.
Beloved Canadian writer Margaret Atwood has expressed her support for the ongoing campaign in Argentina to decriminalise elective abortion, with a personal message for Vice-President Gabriela Michetti.
“Vicepresident of Argentina @gabimichetti: don’t look away from the thousands of deaths every year from ilegal abortions. Give argentinian women the right to choose!”, Atwood wrote on Twitter, citing the hashtags of the #NiUnaMenos movement and those in favour of abortion like #AbortoLegalYa #QueElAbortoSeaLey and #AbortoEnSenadoYa.
Continued: http://www.batimes.com.ar/news/argentina/author-margaret-atwood-tells-argentinas-vp-give-women-the-right-to-choose-abortion.phtml
Miguel Ángel Pichetto
Argentina’s historic vote to decriminalize abortion, explained
Argentina’s Congress has taken up a bill to decriminalize abortion. It probably won’t pass, but activists say it’s a victory regardless.
By Emily Stewart
Across Latin America, 97 percent of women live in countries with restrictive abortion laws. Argentina’s lower legislative house is debating whether to change that and pass a bill that would decriminalize abortion in the country up to the first 14 weeks of pregnancy.
The vote is expected to be close, and even if it does pass, it’s unlikely to get through the Argentine Senate. Still, activists see the fact that the issue is being voted on at all as a major step for women’s rights in the country and throughout the region.
Continued: https://www.vox.com/2018/6/13/17460824/argentina-abortion-bill-ni-una-menos
Catholics for the Right to Decide Argentina
Economía Feminista
Emma Conn
Feminist Economy
José Miguel Vivanco
Shena Cavallo
Tamara Taraciuk Broner
Raped 10-year-old’s pregnancy fuels Argentina abortion debate
Raped 10-year-old's pregnancy fuels Argentina abortion debate
The pregnancy of a 10-year-old girl raped by her stepfather has shocked Argentina, where debate on decriminalizing abortion is in full force ahead of a congressional vote next month.
The child was found to be 21 weeks pregnant when she was taken to hospital with stomach pain.
continued: https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/world/2018-05-25-raped-10-year-olds-pregnancy-fuels-argentina-abortion-debate/
adolescent pregnancy
Argentina: Macri’s Minister Compares Abortion to Femicide, Sparks Outrage
Macri's Minister Compares Abortion to Femicide, Sparks Outrage
#NiUnaMenos, or #NotOneLess, is a movement that protests against femicides — the murder of women in most cases by their partner or ex-partners.
A former minister of Argentina's governing party has sparked outrage after comparing abortion to femicide, claiming that activists from the #NiUnaMenos movement were guilty of femicide if they decided to abort of a baby girl.
During a campaign speech, Esteban Bullrich coopted the anti-femicide rallying cry "Ni Una Menos" or "Not One Less" to argue against abortion rights.
Continued at source: TelesurTV: http://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/Macris-Minister-Compares-Abortion-to-Femicide-Sparks-Outrage-20170801-0039.html
#NotOneLess
Esteban Bullrich
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Research Shows that Young Minorities Suffer More from Police Shootings
Posted by Jazmine Justice-Young | May 15, 2018 | 0
A study published by researchers Anthony Bui, Matthew Coates, and Ellicott Matthay of the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health found a new way to encourage police shooting accountability by calculating the average number of years lost in the lives of police shooting victims.
“Framing police violence as an important cause of deaths among young adults provides another valuable lens to motivate prevention efforts,” researchers wrote. “ [Years of Life Lost will] highlight that police violence disproportionately impacts young people, and the young people affected are disproportionately people of color.”
The researchers pulled data from the Guardian’s police shooting death database, The Counted, and found that in the 1,146 police killings in 2015 and the 1,092 in 2016, 51.5% were people of color. Different studies indicate that Black males between 15 and 34 years of age are 9 to 16 times more likely to be killed by police than any other race. Based on the ages and life expectancies of the victims, an average of 57,375 years of life was lost in 2015 and 54,754 in 2016.
In the wake of the death of Stephon Clark, the unarmed 22-year-old black man killed in his own backyard by Sacramento PD over a month ago, Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg introduced an initiative to reintroduce community police procedure to rebuild the relationship between the community and police officers.
But some people feel as though the relationship between the community and law enforcement is too strained to repair.
Black Lives Matter Sacramento leader, Tanya Faison, feels that the community needs to focus more on self-empowerment and is organizing a cop-watching group with volunteers to help citizens with their inactions with police, believing that these practices will lessen the number of black and brown deaths by police officers.
Whatever way the city decides to handle police shootings, both the city council and advocacy groups seem to agree that police shootings in Sacramento police shooting deaths have gotten out of control.
PreviousVIDEO: NAMI Walks 2018 In Sacramento
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Jazmine Justice-Young
VIDEO: Should 17-Year-Olds Vote?
Librarian layoffs could lead to serious consequences
How reliable is Sacramento Regional Transit
Most People Will Just Scroll Past This Article, But When She Stopped to Write It She Found Out Something INCREDIBLE. Number 2 Will SHOCK You!
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Five Us Internet Providers Are Slowing Down access until They get more Cash
If you’re the customer of a major American internet provider, you might have been noticing it’s not very reliable lately. If so, there’s a pretty good chance that a graph like this is the reason:
These graphs comes from Level 3, one of the world’s largest providers of “transit,” or long-distance internet connectivity. The graph on the left shows the level of congestion between Level 3 and a large American ISP in the Dallas area. In the middle of the night, the connection is less than half-full and everything works fine. But during peak hours, the connection is saturated. That produces the graph on the right, which shows the packet loss rate. When the loss rate is high, thousands of Dallas-area consumers are having difficulty using bandwidth-heavy applications like Netflix, Skype, or YouTube (though to be clear, Level 3 doesn’t say what specific kind of traffic was being carried over this link).
This isn’t how these graphs are supposed to look. Level 3 swaps traffic with 51 other large networks, known as peers. For 45 of those networks, the utilization graph looks more like this:
The graph on the left shows that there is enough capacity to handle demand even during peak hours. As a result, you get the graph at the right, which shows no problems with dropped packets.
So what’s going on? Level 3 says the six bandwidth providers with congested links are all “large Broadband consumer networks with a dominant or exclusive market share in their local market.” One of them is in Europe, and the other five are in the United States.
Level 3 says its links to these customers suffer from “congestion that is permanent, has been in place for well over a year and where our peer refuses to augment capacity. They are deliberately harming the service they deliver to their paying customers. They are not allowing us to fulfill the requests their customers make for content.”
The basic problem is those six broadband providers want Level 3 to pay them to deliver traffic. Level 3 believes that’s unreasonable. After all, the ISPs’ own customers have already paid these ISPs to deliver the traffic to them. And the long-standing norm on the internet is that endpoint ISPs pay intermediaries, not the other way around. Level 3 notes that “in countries or markets where consumers have multiple broadband choices (like the UK) there are no congested peers.” In short, broadband providers that face serious competition don’t engage in this kind of brinksmanship.
Unfortunately, most parts of the US suffer from a severe lack of broadband competition. And the leading ISPs in some of these markets appear to view network congestion not as a technical problem to be solved so much as an opportunity to gain leverage in negotiations with other networks.
Card 13 of 17 Launch cards Netflix has been forced to cut private deals with ISPs. Is that undermining net neutrality? In February, Netflix agreed to pay Comcast to ensure that its videos would play smoothly for Comcast customers. The company signed a similar deal with Verizon in April. Netflix signed these deals because its customers had been experiencing declining speeds for several months beforehand. Netflix realized it would be at a competitive disadvantage if it didn’t pay for speedier service. After its payment to Comcast, Netflix’s customers experienced a 67 percent improvement in their average connection speed.
Netflix has accused Comcast of deliberately provoking the crisis by refusing to upgrade its network to accommodate Netflix traffic, leaving Netflix with little choice but to pay a “toll.” That might sound like a classic network neutrality violation. But surprisingly, leading network neutrality proposals wouldn’t affect this kind of agreement at all.
That’s because Comcast wasn’t technically offering Netflix a “fast lane” on an existing connection. Instead, Netflix paid Comcast to accept a whole new connection. The terms of these agreements, known as “peering,” have always been negotiated in an unregulated market, and network neutrality regulations don’t apply to them.
In theory, Netflix’s deal with Comcast doesn’t violate network neutrality because everyone on this new pipe (e.g. only Netflix) is treated the same, just as everyone on the old, overloaded pipe gets equal treatment. But it’s hard to see any practical difference between the kind of “fast lane” agreement network neutrality supporters have campaigned against and Netflix paying Comcast for a faster connection.
So why hasn’t interconnection been a bigger part of the network neutrality debate? Until recently, it was unheard of for a residential broadband provider like Comcast to demand payment to deliver traffic to its own customers. Traditionally, residential broadband companies would accept traffic from the largest global “backbone” networks such as Level 3 for free. So anyone could reach Comcast customers by routing their traffic through a third network. That limited Comcast’s leverage.
But recently, the negotiating position of backbone providers has weakened while the position of the largest residential ISPs — especially Comcast, Verizon, and AT&T — has gotten stronger. As a consequence, the network neutrality debate will be increasingly linked to the debate over interconnection. Refusing to upgrade a slow link to a company is functionally equivalent to configuring an Internet router to put the company’s packets in a virtual slow lane. Regulations that try to protect net neutrality without regulating the terms of interconnection are going to be increasingly ineffective.
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I want this title to be available as an eBook
The Secret Rules That Govern our Digital Lives
$29.99 (G)
Author: Nicolas P. Suzor, Queensland University of Technology School of Law and Digital Media Research Centre
Publication planned for: July 2019
availability: Not yet published - available from July 2019
$ 29.99 (G)
Pre-order Add to wishlist
Rampant abuse, hate speech, censorship, bias, and disinformation - our Internet has problems. It is governed by technology companies - search engines, social media platforms, and infrastructure providers - whose hidden rules influence what we are allowed to see and say. In Lawless, Nicolas P. Suzor presents gripping examples of exactly how tech companies govern our digital environment and how they bend to pressure from governments and other powerful actors to censor and control the flow of information online. We are at a constitutional moment - an opportunity to rethink the basic rules of how the Internet is governed. Suzor offers a vision of a vibrant, diverse, and flourishing internet that can protect our fundamental rights from the lawless rule of tech. The culmination of more than ten years of original research, this groundbreaking work should be read by anyone who cares about the internet and the future of our shared social spaces.
Includes clear, practical advice for technology companies, civil society organizations, and government regulators
Explains the complexities of regulating the Internet
Critiques how social media companies, search engines, and telecommunications providers shape our social lives
'Lawless is realistic but optimistic about how things on the Internet got so bad and what it will take to fix them. Suzor compellingly describes how constitutionalism and the rule of law can adapt to digital spaces.' James Grimmelmann, Cornell University, New York
'In Lawless, Nicolas P. Suzor doesn't just raise questions about the power tech companies wield, he sets out to answer them, with urgency and care. He offers a lucid, ambitious, wide-ranging, and cautiously hopeful analysis of how platforms govern – and how they should – that comes at just the right moment.' Tarleton Gillespie, Microsoft Research New England and author of Custodians of the Internet
'Suzor's book is a critically important account on the cutting edge of a global sea change in how we imagine our rights will be protected – or not – in a world connected by networked technology.' Kate Klonick, St John's University, New York
'Suzor takes readers on a journey through the challenges and pitfalls of Internet governance. His book is a thoughtful examination of why the constitutional values of legitimacy, transparency and due process are the touchstones we need for a better internet.' Primavera De Filippi, author of Blockchain and the Law
'Suzor's book is a truly thorough look at one of today's most pressing issues and provides real guidance on how we can move forward, together.' Jillian York, Director for International Freedom of Expression, Electronic Frontier Foundation
Part I. A Lawless Internet:
1. The hidden rules of the Internet
2. Who makes the rules? 3. The Internet's abuse problem
4. Legal immunity
5. How copyright shaped the Internet
6. Censorship
7. Lawless
Part II. A New Social Contract – Constitutionalizing Internet Governance:
8. Constitutionalizing Internet governance
9. Constitutionalizing intermediaries
10. What should we expect of intermediaries? 11. The role of states and binding law
12. Conclusion.
Front Matter (98 KB)
Nicolas P. Suzor, Queensland University of Technology School of Law and Digital Media Research Centre
Nicolas P. Suzor is Principal Research Fellow in the Queensland University of Technology's School of Law and Digital Media Research Centre, where he leads a program of work on the governance of digital platforms and internet intermediaries. He has published over forty articles and book chapters in international law reviews and in media and communications journals. He is Deputy Chair and a founding Board Member of Digital Rights Watch in Australia.
Jurisdiction and the Internet
Regulatory Competence over Online Activity
Ethics in an Age of Surveillance
Personal Information and Virtual Identities
Monitoring Laws
Profiling and Identity in the World State
The Fight over Digital Rights
The Politics of Copyright and Technology
Internet Co-Regulation
European Law, Regulatory Governance and Legitimacy in Cyberspace
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ETB Travel News > Africa > Wyndham Grand to launch luxurious lakeside hotel in Downtown Yangon
Wyndham Grand to launch luxurious lakeside hotel in Downtown Yangon
January 23, 2019 Africa, America, Asia, Australia, Europe, Hospitality News, India, Middle East, New Zealand, Top Stories No comments
Wyndham Grand Yangon Lobby Lounge
Wyndham Hotels & Resorts, the world’s largest hotel franchisor and leading provider of hotel management services, has introduced its most luxurious brand to Myanmar with the launch of a spectacular new Wyndham Grand hotel in downtown Yangon.
Wyndham Grand Yangon becomes Wyndham Hotels & Resorts’ second property in Myanmar, following TRYP by Wyndham Yangon, the urban boutique hotel brand that made its debut in 2017. Wyndham Grand is an ensemble of distinguished hotels that are approachable by design, representing one-of-a-kind experiences in key destinations with refined accommodation, attentive service and relaxed surroundings.
Rising from the shores of Kandawgyi Lake, Wyndham Grand Yangon, a new landmark in the heart of Myanmar’s commercial capital, offers breathtaking views of the lake and the golden Shwedagon Pagoda, plus an exquisite blend of grand facilities and authentic local touches that allow guests to enjoy life’s little luxuries.
The striking 20-storey, 291-room luxury hotel forms part of the Kantharyar Centre, a new mixed-use project comprising office spaces, serviced apartments and retail outlets. It has been developed by Asia Myanmar Shining Star Investment Co., Ltd. (AMSS) and will operate under a franchise agreement with Wyndham Hotels & Resorts.
“The Wyndham Grand brand is renowned for its little luxuries – from premium amenities, sophisticated designs to attentive staff across more than 40 hotels and resorts in some of the world’s most beautiful destinations,” said Mr Joon Aun Ooi, President and Managing Director of Wyndham Hotels & Resorts, Southeast Asia and Pacific Rim. “Wyndham Grand Yangon is no exception. The hotel has been built with today’s modern traveller in mind, offering a luxurious hotel concept, an exceptional location and a wide array of dining options and amenities. We are confident that the new Wyndham Grand Yangon will elevate the stay experience for both business and leisure travellers and become a leading hotel in the city.”
Discover little luxuries inspired by local culture
Wyndham Grand Yangon is designed by HASSELL, the renowned architecture and interior design house, as an urban oasis that immerses guests in Yangon’s history and culture. The lobby exudes a resort-style ambience, with paintings of Myanmar’s mountainous silhouette and pagodas serving as the backdrop. Elsewhere, lake views, sheltered walkways and pockets of greenery add to the sense of natural discovery. Throughout the hotel, guests can discover intricate touches that connect them to Burmese tradition, like authentic artefacts, lacquered lamps that take the shape of traditional vessels, and brick red colours – a characteristic of the city.
Stylish stays in modern Yangon
The 291 rooms and suites blend contemporary elegance with a modern touch. Guests can enjoy stunning city and lake views through floor-to-ceiling windows, while wooden floors, state-of-the-art technology, and spacious bathrooms with separate bathtubs and rain showers add to the sense of style.
Guests staying on the Executive Club Floors will enjoy exclusive access to the Executive Lounge, which offers bespoke services, daily buffet breakfast and evening cocktails, plus free use of a meeting room for two hours.
Elevated on the top (20th) floor, the 320 square metre Presidential Suite is a sanctuary of luxury, with a separate meeting area, dining room and private bar, plus a sauna and an indulgent eight-person Jacuzzi. This one-bedroom suite can also be connected with twin or king rooms to sleep additional guests.
Fresh flavours and immersive experiences
Wyndham Grand Yangon features a collection of first-class facilities, including two restaurants and two bars. The Spoon is an all-day dining destination that offers international cuisine, traditional Burmese dishes and a wide range of beverages, including craft beers. The sumptuous daily breakfast combines world favourites with local flavours, including mohinga (Burmese noodle soup). The hotel also features a speciality restaurant serving fine-Thai cuisine, and two bars in the lobby and by the poolside will offer light bites and beverages.
Leisure facilities include a fitness centre and an outdoor pool which offers views of the Kandawgyi Lake. Guests can also pamper themselves with a host of sublime treatments at The Spa including traditional therapies like the spa’s signature four-hand massage. Meanwhile, direct access to a shopping mall makes it easy to indulge in retail therapy.
For corporate guests and event planners, the hotel provides extensive conference and banqueting space, including a 500-delegate Grand Ballroom with a huge LED screen, five meeting rooms with a large pre-function space for cocktail receptions as well as an outdoor garden for alfresco events and weddings.
Perfectly positioned next to Kandawgyi Lake, Kandawgyi Park and Yangon Zoological Gardens, and with views of the shimmering Shwedagon Pagoda, Wyndham Grand Yangon puts the city’s main attractions within easy reach. Guests who want to discover Yangon’s other downtown landmarks, such as Sule Pagoda and Bogyoke Market, can utilise the hotel’s daily shuttle service.
Room rates start from USD112 per night in a Superior Room inclusive of breakfast. Guests can make a reservation via info@wyndhamgrandyangon.com or +95 1 937 7188 or book direct at www.wyndhamhotels.com.
Wyndham Grand Yangon will participate in Wyndham Rewards, the simple-to-use, revolutionary loyalty program from Wyndham Hotels & Resorts. Named the best hotel rewards program for the past three consecutive years by U.S. News and World Report, Wyndham Rewards offers members a generous points earning structure along with a flat, free night redemption rate – the first of its kind for a major rewards program. Learn more at www.wyndhamrewards.com.
Source = Wyndham Hotels & Resorts
HASSELLJoon Aun OoiKandawgyi LakeKandawgyi ParkShwedagon PagodaWyndham Grand YangonWyndham Hotels & ResortsYangon Zoological Gardens
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Wyndham Hotels & Resorts
Wyndham Hotels & Resorts (NYSE: WH) is the world’s largest hotel franchising company, with nearly 9,000 hotels across more than 80 countries on six continents. Through its network of more than 792,000 rooms appealing to the everyday traveler, Wyndham commands a leading presence in both the economy and midscale segments of the lodging industry. The Company operates a portfolio of 20 hotel brands, including Super 8®, Days Inn®, Ramada®, Microtel Inn & Suites®, La Quinta®, Wingate®, AmericInn®, Hawthorn Suites®, The Trademark Collection®, and Wyndham®. Wyndham Hotels & Resorts is also a leading provider of hotel management services, with more than 400 properties under management. The Company’s award-winning Wyndham Rewards loyalty program offers approximately 58 million enrolled members the opportunity to redeem points at thousands of hotels, condominiums and holiday homes globally. For more information, visit www.wyndhamhotels.com.
Website: https://www.wyndhamhotels.com
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Senate Week in Review: July 20-24
By State Sen. Tim Bivins, R-Dixon
SPRINGFIELD – More than 3 weeks into a new fiscal year, the budget stalemate has revealed stark differences in the way reform-minded Republicans and status-quo Democrats envision Illinois’ future.
Gov. Bruce Rauner and Republican lawmakers are seeking a constitutional 12-month budget anchored on solid governmental and business reforms to improve the state’s economy, freeze property taxes, and implement term limits and take “politics” out of the process of drawing legislative boundaries.
Democrat leaders in the Senate and House of Representatives have settled for an unbalanced, 1-month budget, and are advocating for a continuation of failed fiscal policies and unstable business practices that have left Illinois with the third-worst business climate, the second-highest property taxes, and the worst credit ratings of any state.
The Illinois Constitution requires the General Assembly to pass a balanced 12-month budget. In May, Democrat leaders pushed through a plan based on expected revenues of $32 billion and proposed spending of $36 billion. That budget has been vetoed by Rauner, but Democrat lawmakers voted to override several of his vetoes, further complicating budget negotiations.
Both House Speaker Michael Madigan and Senate President John Cullerton repeatedly have said that their number one issue is the budget deficit – not the economy or the taxpayers – and have resisted nearly every effort toward reform. It’s tough to take them at their word because they voted to pass a budget with a $4 billion deficit, and they have introduced no proposals to cut enough or raise taxes to cover the shortfall.
Need for compromise
House lawmakers returned to Springfield July 21 for hearings that Democrat legislative leaders said showed the perils of adopting Rauner’s pro-business agenda. The Senate has its next session days scheduled for next Tuesday and Wednesday.
The General Assembly’s Democrat leaders need to stop the public relations gimmicks like the Committee of the Whole political theater, and make more attempts at compromise. Rauner already has offered to come more than half way by scaling his policy agenda down from more than 40 items in his Turnaround Agenda to only a handful, and backing away from right-to-work legislation. He has also offered movement on tax reform to find additional revenues to help balance the budget.
Governor seeks federal flood relief for crops
On July 23, Rauner sent a letter to USDA officials requesting all counties in Illinois experiencing crop damage related to recent flooding be included in a Secretarial Disaster Declaration, which would provide farmers in designated counties the ability to receive low-interest emergency loans if they meet all eligibility requirements.
The State Emergency Board met Monday to review the county emergency board minutes and loss assessments in preparation for determining county eligibility. The Illinois Department of Agriculture will continue to assist U.S. Farm Service Agency officials in securing benefits for farmers who are impacted by flooding.
Even those crops not damaged directly by flooding have suffered. Long periods of rain and drenched fields have slowed farmers all season and so far, crops haven’t been able to make up for the slow start. According to the USDA, the second cutting of hay is only 52 percent complete, compared to the 5-year average of 83 percent. Ninety-six percent of soybeans have now emerged from the soil, still behind the 5-year average of 100 percent. Corn plants are silking at a rate of 75 percent, compared to the typical 77 percent at this point, although 17 percent have reached the dough stage, which is actually ahead of the 5-year average of 16 percent.
Precipitation 2 weeks ago averaged .97 inches across the state, .18 inches more than normal, leaving an average of 3.3 days suitable for fieldwork, although many farmers were still waiting on fields to dry out more before they were able to work.
Crop conditions are dropping again, with 56 percent of corn acres rated as good or excellent, compared to 61 percent 2 weeks ago, and 47 percent of soybeans receiving the same marks, down from 52 percent.
Bills signed into law
Go to the Senate Republican Caucus website at senategop.state.il.us and search for About the Senate/Senate Action for a complete list of bills on which the governor has taken action.
Only vegetables for me
Only flowers for me
Both veggies and flowers
No garden for me
Privacy PolicyPlace a Classified AdCareers
Copyright © 2019 Prairie Advocate. All rights reserved. Published in Lanark, Illinois, USA, by Shaw Media.
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Planning Committee Meeting Notes – 11/10/2017
Meeting Participants: Willa, David, Fatimah, Richard, Pauline, Edwin, Charity, Les, Lauren
ALUMNI RELATIONS: no update
Fatimah visited the Transportation Museum in Spencer, NC. They did a good job of displaying her grandfather’s jacket as a part of its train exhibit. Willa asked if there’s an update on getting the school’s copy of the Rosenwald documentary. Fatimah will follow up. The director may have added more footage.
Income from OLLI: $200; all bills to date have been paid. See agenda for details
Contributions to date: $108,419.29
Expenditures to date: $86,548.64
Balance: $21,870.61
Need to send a gentle reminder for window fund for those who have not paid in full yet. Michael has the contract part on file. Status of plaques: window frames need to be completed before the plaques are purchased.
Exterior doors are stained. Soon, door pane will be painted. Dennis King (president at AB Tech) visited the school recently and mentioned that the school’s construction program may be able to work on interior and electrical – but not plumbing. Mike Griffin has volunteered to do the plumbing free of charge. We need an underpinning crew to work on the supports. The handrails can be done by the AB Tech Madison campus’s welding program. The teacher of the course is from the area; the school would have to provide the materials and an honorarium.
Willa/David to the Madison County School board members as there are state funds available to use for the project. Just need to work with superintendent when Dr. Cosby when he returns from medical leave.
Willa mentioned that we need to get history booklet updated with new pictures. We will print the updated booklet at the Central Office. Ryan has taken new pictures, just need to follow up when he returns from his honeymoon/vacation. There are some brochures at the I-26 Welcome Center. Richard recommended that the history committee look at the narrative updates to brochure.
Fatimah commented on the draft National Register nomination form. Wanted to know if we could add more names of the school to the narrative, names that the locals used for the school. Willa noted that one interested finding the consultant revealed the school was built as a 1-room school (based on dimensions) as it was not large enough officially to be a 2-room school. Richard recommended we have further discussion about this finding as the “industrial room” may have served as a back-up room.
Willa requested that we all review the draft nomination form. Because it is very long, we will work on having copies printed at the Central Office for those who need it.
Willa went to Madison Middle School’s Veteran Day celebration. Some of the teachers did not know about the school. She plans to reach out the school system, so there can be a teacher day at the school in February. Lauren recommended also reaching out to the principle at Barnardsville Elementary School.
OLLI VISIT
We have 32 individuals signed up. Les can only accommodate 22 people at a time in the museum. Should consider dividing the group into two. Willa will bring some old wooden chairs from Madison Baptist Church – maybe 4 dozen. The church is giving them away. Les and Willa will have pamphlets. Richard will gather info so that participants can also do the self-guided tour of the historic quad if they wish.
The next meeting on Dec 8 will focus on reviewing grant/available funding opportunities. Willa will find some space in the Mars Hill area.
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Rent boats and ships
In order to know the price, please contact us
Catamaran Turbo diesel Jet Hamilton
Designed by the famous designer Nigel Gee, built in Southampton, designed to carry 12 passengers at speeds up to 27 knots. Condition of the hull and superstructure in very good condition, healthy, preserved and painted. In 2013 the unit underwent a major overhaul of engines, now stands on the water in Szczecin, to view by appointment.
IVA - Passenger 66 people
All navigation equipment, control, electronic compass gps designed for 66 passengers, hydraulic control, two motors. Renewal class engines capitalize on repairs, a refreshed, new shaft bearings, newly renovated.
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Built in the Naval Shipyard Gdynia, on board takes up to 37 passengers. The ship underwent a major renovation, refreshed interior, it features a new Beta Marine engine 38KM
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A vessel equipped for commercial passenger transport. Reaches a speed of about 8-10 km / h With mahogany construction and finish is a real soul. Very manoeuvrable and comfortable, will satisfy even the most demanding customers. Once it is able to carry up to 64 passengers.
Copyright © Bearliner 2013
Design: virtual people
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Labyrneath
There have been 681 plays and 5 likes from 5 votes (100%) since 15/10/2018.
Adventure Puzzle Platform
Labyrneath 2
Super Mario Maker Online
You are currently playing Labyrneath game for free on Arcade Spot. It is a single game out of a variety of games that you can play on Arcade Spot. Play more games like Labyrneath in the Adventure, Puzzle, and Platform gaming categories. This game has a rating of 100 out of 100 based on 5 user ratings. If you enjoyed playing the game then give it a thumbs up. You can also play similar games such as Labyrneath 2 and Pokemon Emerald Version as shown above. Arcade Games and Free Online Games are added every day. Arcade Spot will bring you the best games without downloading and a fun online gaming experience on the internet.
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July 23 - Why is Trump Going After the Top Intel Officials Who Briefed Him?; Trump and Rouhani Exchange Threats; As Trump Goes Up in the Polls, What Liberals Get Wrong About His Support
LISTEN TO FULL PROGRAM
We begin with the latest act of pettiness from a thin-skinned petulant president who today announced that he was considering revoking the security clearances of his critics, naming six former top intelligence officials; former CIA head John Brennan, former FBI head James Comey, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, former National Security Advisor Susan Rice, former NSA head Michael Hayden and former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe. Loch Johnson, the Regents Professor of Political Science at the University of Georgia who served on the senior staffs of both the House and Senate intelligence Committees and is the author of “Spy Watching: Intelligence Accountability in the United States”, joins us to discuss this latest effort to distract the press and feed Trump’s base with more imaginary mendacity from the “deep state”. Since both McCabe and Comey no longer have security clearances, the hollow nature of the ploy is already apparent, and as The New York Times recently revealed, Trump was told of Russia’s meddling in the election and of possible “kompromat” Putin has on him in briefings by Brennan, Clapper and Comey two weeks before taking office. But ever since then, as Trump keeps repeating “no collusion”, he appears haunted by what these “deep state” top officials who briefed him know. Could that be why he is going after them?
Then we speak with Juan Cole, a professor of Modern Middle Eastern and South Asian History at the University of Michigan and author of the blog, Informed Comment at JuanCole.com. He joins us to discuss Trump’s threatening tweet in capital letters to Iran’s president in response to Rouhani’s threat of “a mother of all wars” if the U.S. keeps pressuring customers not to buy Iranian oil. We assess Secretary of State Pompeo’s remarks that Iran is a “mafia state” run by hypocrites in clerical robes who are stealing the country blind, something the Iranian people already know.
Then finally, with the latest NBC/WSJ poll showing Trump is going up with 45% now supporting him and with 88% support from Republicans, in spite of negative reactions to Trump’s border policies and his performance at the recent press conference with Putin, we speak with Henry Olsen, a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center and author of “The Working Class Republican: Ronald Reagan and the Return of Blue Collar Conservatism”. He joins us to discuss his article at The Guardian “What liberals (still) get wrong about Trump’s support” and how Republicans don’t care about who Trump is but rather like what he does.
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by Elena Ledda
Turning a building green is a question of control
Managing the building’s different energy processes is key to ensure both higher energy efficiency and users’ comfort, but users hold part of the responsibility
Sustainable buildings partly depend on control strategies to be energy efficient. Implementation of possible control systems are now under study for two of the three showcases buildings, developed under the EU funded DIRECTION project, namely the CARTIF III building in Valladolid, Spain and the NuOffice in Munich, Germany. The third showcase, based in Bolzano, Italy, which has not been built yet, is therefore offering more opportunities for potential change of control systems. “From an energy efficiency point of view the main installations to take into account are air conditioning and electricity,” explains José Louis Alfranca, head of installation services at the Spanish construction company DRAGADOS, in Madrid, and one of the project partners.
“The [three] showcases will feature centralised control systems based on an architecture with distributed logic,” Alfranca explains. Having a distributed logic means that each control acts autonomously while, at the same time, communicating with a central control site. This is the case, for example, of the type of controls used for air conditioning, dubbed DDC or direct digital control.
Generally, control relies both on a series of sensors measuring for example the temperature, humidity, lighting level and on various actuators, such as valves engine and lighting regulators. Incorporating buildings’ automation within the architectural design and installations’ planning stage is key to have effective control systems, according to Inés Alomar, free-lance energy consultant, based in Barcelona, Spain. “Otherwise it can take a lot of time to run the building or there might be strategies and [technologies] that cannot be implemented [at later stage],” she says.
There is not a single possible strategy for implementing control systems. Existing state-of-the-art solutions are many. For example, one involves using data orchestration, where data coming from different sources are combined into a single output. Another approach includes binding the results of the probes with the dynamic modelling of the building through a so-called grey box. Other solutions involve using control systems that optimise energy consumption and energy bills by producing heat or cold at times when energy price is low, and storing it in inertia depositories so that it is ready to be used upon request. The preferred choice for each individual showcase building is still under study.
A possible additional control feature to ensure high energy efficiency and users’ comfort, especially in office buildings, is to include access or presence control systems. This is the view of Kristian Fabbri, adjunct professor of technical environmental physics at the University of Bologna and a freelance building energy performance consultant, based in Cesena, Italy. The office and test facilities areas in Valladolid and the common areas in Munich are due to have sensors that will work differently depending on whether people are present or absent, according to Sergio Sanz, DIRECTION coordinator. No information is available yet for the Bolzano building.
Users can also actively participate in improving energy efficiency through a feedback system informing them of the impact of their actions. “Control and automation are key to disclose the energy [use] we do not see. Once we start seeing it, we will be able to actually save it [by being proactive],” Alomar comments. Generally, systems combining at certain times of the day centralised and manual management would be preferred “to avoid users become slaves of energy efficiency,” she adds. But giving users control has some limitations. “Of course users need to be informed, but giving them excessive freedom can be a real disaster since people tend not to manage control in a rational way”, says Alfranca. Ultimately, Fabbri concludes, control systems will be more and more dynamic with energy consumption information regularly shared through social networks.
Image credits to: Peter Pearson
December 2012Heat trading warms up
March 2013Air conditioning control goes wireless
May 2013User awareness key to effective energy monitoring
August 2014Noemí Jiménez and Carolina Grau – solving the energy challenge in public buildings
Country: Italy, Spain, Switzerland
In Section Ecobuildings
Smart buildings of glass
Building renovations: social aid to accept the change
Building energy efficient communities
District Heating 2.0
Twenty-two million smart homes in Europe: from science-fiction to reality
Useful Steam - Heat Recovery
Home sweet (hemp) home
When citizen engagement makes the difference
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Boxing trainer Michael ‘Coach Mike’ Kozlowski trains Olympic Champion Luke Campbell in England.
Posted on 12. Jun, 2014 by BoxingCoachMike in News
In the beginning of 2008 Russian boxing trainer, who trains his students in legendary Gleason’s Boxing Gym in Brooklyn, New York, started working with English boxer Luke Campbell. In the end of 2008 Luke Campbell won Gold medal in European Championships and in 2012 he won Olympic Gold !
Now Luke Campbell is a professional boxer with 5(4ko) – 0.
Based in USA Coach Mike for the first time during their teamwork has arrived to London to help Luke Campbell to prepare for the following fight in his professional career.
Luke has shown to his an American trainer his home town Hull.
A first class postage stamp, depicting Campbell, was issued by Royal Mail and a post box in Hessle Road, Hull and was painted gold to commemorate his gold medal win.
Boxing Trainer Michael "Coach Mike" Kozlowski and Luke Campbell.
Local telephone network provider, KC, have also commemorated the win by painting one of their telephone boxes, near to St Paul’s Boxing Club, in gold !
The Russian-American trainer and English boxer have spend some trainings in the Olympic Boxing Center of Great Britain in Sheffield.
Here, for the first time, face to face, were two trainers who took direct part in preparation, already, the Olympic Champion, Luke Campbell: the Head Coach of the Great Britain Boxing Team, Dave Alloway and the Russian-American trainer, Michael ‘Coach Mike’ Kozlowski.
After last training in GB Boxing Olympic Center, Dave Alloway told to Coach Mike, that Russian trainer has made great work with Luke Campbell, as he well remembers with how was the English boxer before Michael Kozlowski has started to train him…
Boxing Coach Michael Kozlowski, Luke Campbell and Dave Alloway in GB Olympic Boxing Center.
Coach Mike and his student trained every day and twice per day. More time they worked on Luke’s boxing technique and physical condition.
Luke Campbell from Olesya on Vimeo.
With over 5,000 people signed up for the event, the Asda Foundation Hull 10K boasted the biggest field since its launch by Jane Tomlinson’s Run For All in 2010.
Starting the race – and running it – was one of Hull’s favorite sons, Olympic gold medal boxer Luke Campbell, who notched up an impressive time of 39 minutes.
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State Teachers’ Union Wants Regents Involved in Correcting Test System
May 09, 2019Education, State/National NewsComments Off on State Teachers’ Union Wants Regents Involved in Correcting Test System
By Patti Singer
– pattisinger@minorityreporter.net –
The union representing teachers in New York called on the state Board of Regents to get involved in fixing what the union said is a broken testing system for grades 3 through 8 and students learning English.
New York State United Teachers has no confidence that the state Education Department under Commissioner MaryEllen Elia can create an equitable system that treats all students and schools fairly, according to a news release. More than 1,700 delegates at the union’s annual convention unanimously passed a resolution May 4 that called on the Board of Regents to direct the Education Department to make a series of changes that include involving teachers at every step of the process and represent the diversity of the state.
“We have received reports from every corner of the state about testing issues that have left students, parents and educators exasperated, yet the state has not outlined any plan to ensure these problems do not happen ever again,” NYSUT executive vice president Jolene DiBrango said in a news release. “The time for action is now. We look forward to working with the Board of Regents to ensure the voices of educators finally reverberate throughout the Education Department.”
NYSUT has launched a campaign called Correct the Tests to raise awareness of what the union said are serious issues with the grades 3 through 8 English Language Arts and math tests. The union also expressed concern about the New York State English as a Second Language Achievement Test. The union said the tests are harmful to students and it criticized computer-based testing.
State Education Commissioner MaryEllen Elia
“We will review NYSUT’s resolution,” Education Department spokeswoman Emily DeSantis wrote in an email in response to a request for comment. “As we have for the past four years, we welcome input from New York state’s teachers and look forward to continuing this dialogue as we look toward further improvements in our state assessments.”
NYSUT has more than 600,000 members in education, human services and health care. The union has passed previous resolutions about state testing, spokesman Matt Hamilton wrote in an email. “What is different this year is that the resolution states we don’t have confidence that the state Education Department will fix these issues on their own, so we call on the Board of Regents to direct them to do it. We certainly have voiced our concerns in the past, but calling for that action is what makes this year’s resolution unique.”
Hamilton said issues with tests are part of ongoing conversations with the Board of Regents and the Education Department. “We hope to have this addressed in an expedited manner. But do we have a hard timeline for them of when the changes might come? No.”
According to the Education Department, Elia and the Board of Regents have listened to concerns of teachers and parents and made changes as a result. The department said that starting last year, English Language Arts and math sessions were reduced. For the fourth year in a row, tests are not timed. The department said that ELA tests were reduced by three passages and by six or seven multiple-choice questions, depending on grade level. In the math tests, extended construction-response questions were reduced and depending on grade level, seven to 13 multiple-choice questions were eliminated.
At the annual convention in early May, the NYSUT Representative Assembly passed the following resolution:
Whereas, the State Education Department (SED) and Commissioner Elia have failed to make the changes to the State grade 3-8 testing system and NYSESLAT recommended by NYSUT including re-setting the benchmarks, reducing testing and making the tests more developmentally appropriate; and
Whereas, the state grade 3-8 testing system and NYSESLAT need a major overhaul to ensure the system is equitable and treats all students and schools fairly; and
Whereas, the benchmarks for the state grade 3-8 tests and NYSESLAT were set at unrealistic levels; and
Whereas, these benchmarks have led to students and schools being mislabeled as failures; and
Whereas, the benchmarks on the state tests must be re-set first to ensure a fair testing system; and
Whereas, the state grade 3-8 tests and NYSESLAT continue to be too long because the SED and the Commissioner failed to properly reduce the number of questions when eliminating a day of testing; and
Whereas, the untimed state grade 3-8 tests and NYSESLAT have led to students spending more time on these tests than high school students spend on Regents exams; and
Whereas, the state grade 3-8 tests and NYSESLAT contain developmentally inappropriate reading passages and test questions; and
Whereas, the state continues to press forward on computer based testing despite evidence that tests scores drop when switching to computer based testing; and
Whereas, the computer based testing system continues to have major technical failures in implementation; and
Whereas, many districts do not have the capacity to implement computer based testing; and
Whereas, computer based testing measures a student’s ability to use a computer rather than the student’s knowledge of the subject being tested; and
Whereas, teacher involvement in the test development process is limited to small committees that cannot properly represent the diversity of the state; and
Whereas, NYSUT has no confidence in the Commissioner and the State Education Department to make the necessary changes to fix the state’s grade 3-8 testing system and NYSESLAT on their own.
The delegates resolved that the union will advocate for the regents to direct the commissioner of education to:
provide for the meaningful involvement of teachers selected by the union in every phase of the test development process; and
set the appropriate benchmarks by a large group of teachers representing the diversity of the state to ensure the tests accurately measure student knowledge and learning; and
reducing the number of questions on the grade 3-8 tests and NYSESLAT; and
conducting an independent study of the performance of students on computer based testing versus paper and pencil tests to determine the impact on school accountability; and
forming a committee of practitioners to review the study on computer based testing and develop a plan for the appropriate implementation of computer based testing including determining the appropriate grade level to begin computer based testing.
According to the Education Department, teachers from across the state are involved in creating, reviewing and selecting questions for the 2019 grades 3 through English Language Arts and math tests. This year, teachers reviewed all questions at least six times.
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Utah State and Fort Hare University Conservationist Tapped for U.N. Expert Panel on Biodiversity
Jun 18, 2018Education, Featured News, State/National News, Top Stories, WorldComments Off on Utah State and Fort Hare University Conservationist Tapped for U.N. Expert Panel on Biodiversity
(TriceEdneyWire.com/GIN) – U.N. activities for World Environment Day recently were focused this year on plastic pollution. Marked every year since 1974, the day is celebrated in over 100 countries.
Dr. Luthando Dziba, managing executive for conservation services at South African National Parks (SANParks) has been appointed to the UN body on biodiversity and ecosystems.
Dziba, who studied at Utah State University and Fort Hare University in the U.S., says he’s looking forward to engaging with people worldwide in finding solutions for the sustainability of the world’s natural assets.
In a video marking the June event, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres warned that “our world is swamped by harmful plastic waste. Every year, more than eight million tons end up in the oceans.” That leaves virtually nowhere on earth untouched, with the potential that by 2050 there will be more plastic than fish in the world’s oceans.
Nearly every African country, including the island nations sensitive to the impact of plastics on their ecosystems, has events marking the day. There are beach cleanups in Cape Verde, student plastic-bag pickups in Burkina Faso, a university campus cleanup in Angola, and educational workshops in South Africa.
Volunteers in Djibouti will head out to clean up the coastline along the Gulf of Aden, while across the continent their counterparts in Sierra Leone will focus on cleaning up their Atlantic Ocean shores.
“Today provides an opportunity for each of us to embrace the many ways that we can combat plastic pollution around the world,” said Dr. Richard Munang, an Africa climate change and development policy expert for the UN Environmental Program based in Kenya.
UNEP chief Erik Solheim called plastic pollution a form of violence against the planet.
In Nigeria, community partners are offering free bus rides in exchange for turning in a single-use plastic item for recycling as part of the #waste4ride campaign. And in Malawi, participants will learn how to build benches out of bricks made from the plastics.
For more information about World Environment Day and how to participate, visit the website: worldenvironmentday.global/en/get-involved/find-event.
GLOBAL INFORMATION NETWORK creates and distributes news and feature articles on current affairs in Africa to media outlets, scholars, students and activists in the U.S. and Canada. Our goal is to introduce important new voices on topics relevant to Americans, to increase the perspectives available to readers in North America and to bring into their view information about global issues that are overlooked or under-reported by mainstream media.
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35mm And APS Compact Cameras
Peter K. Burian | Jun 1, 2002
Although everyone at the PMA show wanted to check out the new digital equipment, the compact lens/shutter film cameras still outsell such models. Most manufacturers continue to offer both formats: 35mm and Advanced Photo System (APS or 24mm). Such cameras have been made for decades so we didn't expect to see many radical changes. Nonetheless, a few Minolta and Canon models do include some entirely new technology.
What's more obvious is that many such cameras have been downsized. Most of the new models are slimmer and lighter in weight than their predecessors. As well, more and more models feature a metal exterior, increasing their visual and tactile appeal. Although dozens of cameras were introduced, I'll review only those that might be of primary interest to Shutterbug readers.
APS Cameras
Frankly, I did not find many new APS cameras at the PMA show and Minolta announced that they would cease manufacturing of such models. However, Eastman Kodak and other companies remain committed to APS, so this format should continue for many years.
In fact, the single most interesting compact camera announced so far this year is an APS format autofocus model. To be available only in early 2003, the Advantix Easy Share is actually a hybrid, combining the benefits of film and digital imaging. Offering the best of both worlds, this Kodak model takes pictures on Advantix film but also records a digital image. After taking a shot, you can view your pictures immediately, including the probable exposure level. If you don't like the exposure or the composition, simply re-shoot the picture. You can also press a button to tell the camera (and the photofinisher) how many prints you'll want (including zero) from each of the negatives.
The image preview feature is already available with the first generation Advantix Preview model, but the Advantix Easy Share offers some significant new features. Instead of storing only one image, the new camera can store 72 screen resolution pictures. Image file size will be small, probably 640x320 pixels, but more than adequate for Internet use. Any of the images can also be downloaded to a computer and sent by e-mail with the touch of a button on the accessory docking station (included). This autofocus camera is equipped with a 2x digital zoom and multimode flash plus the Kodak Picture Software and will be surprisingly affordable. (Estimated Street Price: $200.)
Canon's ELPH series has been extremely successful and now includes a new model, the ELPH Z3. Completely redesigned, it has a more streamlined look. Attractively finished in aluminum alloy with chrome-plated parts, it's even more elegant than its predecessors. Measuring 3.9x2.0x1.3" and weighing a mere 5.3 oz, the new ELPH Z3 is very portable. It features a 23.5-54mm f/4.8-7.6 zoom lens (29.4-67.5mm equivalent in 35mm) including a molded aspherical element. (Street Price: $180.)
The ELPH Z3 uses a newly-developed seven-zone, three-point AiAF CMOS passive autofocus system identical to the one described in the Sure Shot Z155 (35mm) section. It can immediately identify the main subject without the need to lock focus and recompose the image. In order to achieve even greater efficiency and performance, a 13-segment exposure metering system is integrated onto the same chip as the autofocus sensor for good exposures even in difficult lighting. Other capabilities include multimode flash, continuous autofocus, and full Magnetic Information Exchange (IX) for high quality photofinishing.
Fujifilm's Nexia Q1 features a round body that comes in fashionable metallic colors: blue, cyan, pink, and purple. Small enough to fit into the palm of a hand, or a large shirt pocket, the Nexia Q1 is intended as a "cool" camera that will appeal to children and teens who want to snap pictures during vacations, parties, and other occasions.
It includes all the basic features for great snapshots: autofocus, multimode flash, 22mm lens, drop-in film loading, and the choice of two APS formats: C and H, but not Panorama. My daughters (ages 16 and 21) both want one of these cameras, and their reaction suggests that the Fujifilm Nexia Q1 will become a best seller. Considering the Street Price (roughly $50, including battery and a roll of film) this model may replace single-use cameras as a favorite among children and teens.
High Tech 35mm Point-And-Shoots
Canon's latest compact 35mm camera is the Sure Shot Z155, a sleek, lightweight (8 oz) model in a gorgeous aluminum shell with a 37-155mm f/4.8-11.7 zoom with one aspherical element. Billed as "the world's smallest and lightest camera with a 155mm zoom" this camera also features the unique autofocus system mentioned in the ELPH Z3 section. It's designed to evaluate three focusing points from a total of seven in three stages, to maximize the odds of sharp focus with off-center subjects. The autoexposure sensor of the Z155 has been combined with the AF sensor into one unit and is constructed from a single chip. The evaluative light meter has 16 zones, and backlight detection is possible for any AF point. Because metering and autofocus are integrated, the system emphasizes exposure accuracy for the focused subject. A backlight compensation control (+1.5 EV) is also available. Other features include seven Program modes and built-in multimode flash. (List Price: $300.)
Minolta introduced a new, highly sophisticated autofocus system, available in their Freedom Zoom 160 and 140 models. Called AREA-AF this technology is quite advanced and worth reviewing. Look through the viewfinder and the eyepiece sensors automatically activate the AF system. A large, multi-line CCD sensor differentiates between people and objects; then the system evaluates subject shape, distance, location, and brightness. Target AF automatically adjusts focus and exposure for the primary subject, usually a person if one is included in the frame. If the subject moves within the picture area, another AF sensor takes over focus. Note, too, that these cameras incorporate three autofocus options: the common wide area and spot modes, plus Target AF (described earlier) with continuous focus for moving subjects.
Minolta has received accolades for their technology: the largest focus detection area of any film camera; the first camera with (human) subject detection; unique Matrix autofocus indication in the viewfinder and automatic LED brightness control. The new models also offer advanced subject-weighted 125-zone evaluative metering for optimum exposure; Eye-Start automation; new high-speed AF motor; autofocus with 942 steps and a 32-bit RISC processor for high-speed AF with true predictive continuous tracking focus for maximum accuracy with moving subjects. According to Minolta, they now offer "the world's fastest (two or three times faster) focusing compact cameras with 3x or greater zoom."
Considering the above, I was amazed at the moderate prices of the new Minolta models with AREA-AF ($180 and $200). They feature slim, lightweight aluminum bodies and weigh only 6.9 oz. The Freedom Zoom 140 has a 37.5-140mm f/5.4-11.7 zoom, while the Freedom Zoom 160 extends to 160mm (f/5.4-12.4). Both include two aspherical elements for high image quality. These are uncomplicated cameras with Program mode, sophisticated multimode flash with exposure compensation control, zoom finder, an optional remote controller, and more.
Long Zoom Point-And-Shoots
Minolta's Freedom Zoom 130, with a 37.5-130mm f/4-10.5 aspherical zoom and stainless steel front shell, employs a more traditional active AF system. Its 2049 focusing steps and four infrared beams should assure reliable and accurate focus. This camera (7.4 oz) includes several Program modes, backlight compensation control (+1.5 EV), zoom finder, sophisticated multimode flash with exposure compensation control, and an optional remote controller unit. (List Price: $150.)
Fujifilm's new Zoom Date 1300 is also a highly compact camera in a metallic body; it's said to be the "world's smallest and lightest (6.35 oz) 4x zoom model." Note that this is one of the very few cameras with a long zoom that starts at 28mm: it's a 28-130mm f/5.8-11.5 lens with pro-grade EBC multi-coating. What's also impressive is the huge LCD data panel and thumb pad, both borrowed from digital camera designs. The Fujifilm Zoom Date 1300 includes a multimode flash with Programmed Zoom that automatically adjusts flash power for subject distance as well as ambient light. Other features include passive AF system, Macro and Landscape focusing modes, date imprinting, and an optional remote controller. (List Price: $350.)
Available at a more moderate price, the new Fujifilm Zoom Date 125 SR includes a more typical lens: 38-125mm f/5.3-10.5. This camera (under 7 oz) sports a new champagne color with a gold trim, making it very stylish. The Fujifilm Zoom Date 125 SR employs an active infrared AF system and features a Program mode, multimode auto zoom flash and Easy Loading system. The kit includes a remote controller unit. Nearly identical, the Fujifilm Zoom Date 110 SR incorporates a 38-110mm f/6.5-11.7 zoom. (List Prices: $260 and $200.)
Rollei makes many compact 35mm cameras. Their new model with a long zoom is the Prego 160 with a Vario Apogon 38-160mm f/5.8-12.6 zoom of German design. This is a handsome model with aluminum front shell and an illuminated, and huge, LCD menu panel on the back. That feature plus a thumb pad control make it reminiscent of a digital camera with maximum convenience for selecting various functions. The most notable Prego 160 feature is a variable power flash: it automatically reduces output for close-up shots to prevent overexposure or a harsh lighting effect. This is a Program camera with several flash modes, date imprinting, diopter correction eyepiece, Panorama Frame mode, and wide area passive autofocus system. (List Price: $329.)
Nikon bills their Lite-Touch 130ED/QD as "the world's smallest and lightest 35mm camera with sliding lens cover and 3.4x zoom." It is small and lightweight (6.7 oz) but sports a 38-130mm f/5.3-10.5 lens with ED (Extra low Dispersion) glass that promises "incredibly sharp photographs." Advanced autofocus is also included: a 628-step wide area passive AF system should ensure excellent focus accuracy, even for off-center subjects at any distance. Other niceties include five-mode flash, date imprinting, Panorama Frame mode, diopter correction eyepiece, and an optional remote control unit. (List Price: $255.)
Boasting the longest lens of any of the compact cameras introduced at the PMA show, the Samsung Maxima 170 GLM QD includes a 38-170mm "high definition" zoom and passive, multi-point autofocus system. Samsung did not yet have full specs on this model, but it includes multimode flash, date imprinting back, and a Panorama Frame mode. (List Price: $330.)
Similar Samsung models with shorter lenses include the Maxima Zoom 140Ti ($280) with a 38-140mm f/4.7-12.2 zoom and the 120Ti ($180) with a 38-120mm f/4.5-13.1 zoom. These are close-focusing (to under 3") "high definition" lenses with two aspherical elements. Both models include a date back, diopter correction eyepiece, five subject-specific Program modes, plus continuous AF for moving subjects, employing a multi-point passive system. The 140Ti has some extras: Panorama Frame mode, backlight control, slow sync flash, dial mode button, and caption imprinting. Samsung also offers the new Fino 120 Super QD model that's very similar to the 120Ti but using active autofocus and without continuous AF. (List Price: $200.)
Samsung also makes another line with "Italian design" and superior lens, called Pronta. Available in "limited quantities," the Pronta 1200QD (7.4 oz) sports a 38-120mm f/4.8-12.4 Schneider-Kreuznach Variopolan lens. Features include active AF with Continuous mode, basic multimode flash, illuminated LCD data panel, caption/date imprinting, mid roll rewind, Program mode, and a Bulb mode for exposures up to 60 sec long. (List Price: $220.)
In Samsung's Evoca line, intended for the "photo enthusiast," we found several new models with Schneider-Kreuznach zoom lenses, including the Evoca 140 Neo QD and the 170 Neo QD. The first has a 38-140mm f/4.6-12.2 zoom while the other model has a 38-170mm zoom. Both are housed in a stylish aluminum body, and offer many features: two Program modes, Bulb for long exposures, continuous autofocus, date/caption imprinting, and advanced multimode flash. The 170 Neo QD is the flagship of the line and offers some extras: passive (not active) multi-point autofocus, Panorama Frame mode, and backlight compensation control. (List Prices: $300 and $320.)
Cameras With Moderate Zooms
Samsung's Evoca line now includes a model with a zoom lens that includes a true wide angle 28mm focal length. The Evoca 90W Neo QD is a fully automatic model with a 28-90mm f/4.5-11 Schneider-Kreuznach lens and diopter correction eyepiece. In spite of the moderate price ($210) this camera is said to be housed in a titanium body. Features include continuous autofocus, two Program modes, Panorama Frame mode, and a remote control unit, plus an advanced flash unit.
Rollei also offers a camera with a 28mm focal length, the Prego 100WA with high grade Vario 28-100mm f/5.8-10.5 zoom designed in Germany. Other than the lens, it is identical to the Prego 160 discussed earlier, and also features the oversized and illuminated LCD menu panel and thumb pad controls. At 5.6 oz, it's one of the lightest cameras in its category. (List Price: $299.)
The new Pentax IQZoom 115V is also a very compact and moderately lightweight camera (8.5 oz) with a 38-115mm f/4.3-12.2 zoom that will focus down to a mere 2.6. This is an uncomplicated model with the basic capabilities: a Program mode, active AF system, zoom finder, and advanced flash system. (List Price: $150.)
List of Manufacturers/Distributors
Fujifilm Shows Off X-E3 Mirrorless Camera and Two...
Hands-On with the New Tamron 100-400mm f/4.5-6.3...
We Took a Closer Look at the New Nikon D850 DSLR...
Is This the Mirrorless Camera DSLR Users Will...
The Canon G1 X Mark III Compact Camera Has a DSLR...
Products of the Future: Canon Expo 2015 Offers...
Pictures Of The Year International: At The Museum...
photokina: 3D, VR, Dollies & More: Unique...
CES Photo Tech Notes: Get Connected, Go Retro...
photokina: “Out Of The Mainstream” Pro Cameras...
New Camera Report: The Class Of 2013: At...
At The Harn Museum: Photography From The Interwar...
Bags & Carrying Systems; Stow And Go Page 2
Film & Paper; New Life For Silver-Based...
Lighting & Studio; Continuous Light, LEDs,...
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recent awards and recognitions
Chicago Community Trust Emerging Leader Fellow-2012
The City of Chicago introduced Rob as a emerging leader within the community for his work with Beyond the Ball.
National MetLife Foundation Community-Police Partnership Award- 2012
The National MetLife Foundation recognized Rob's work with Beyond the Ball.
Champion of Change Award, Presented by the White House- 2012
The White House recognized Rob's work with Beyond the Ball with the Champion of Change Award.
2011 Good Sport in the Community Award - March, 2011
Good Sports honored Rob and Amy with the 2011 Good Sport in the Community Award for serving disadvantaged youth through sports, fitness and recreation.
2011 Sports Ethics Fellows - March, 2011
Rob and Amy were selected by the Positive Coaching Alliance and Institute for International Sport as 2011 Sports Ethics Fellows for making a huge impact on sports and through sports into the rest of society so that youth may benefit.
Asked to address National LISC at 30th Anniversary Event - March, 2011
Rob was asked to address the National LISC organization at their 30th Anniversary event, sharing his expertise and urging the importance of community building through sport.
The PrivateBank Norman Bobins Leadership Award - February, 2011
Rob and Amy Castañeda were honored as emerging leaders for their work in Little Village and across Chicago at the 2011 Chicago Neighborhood Development Awards.
Beyond Sport “Most Courageous Use of Sport” Award - Fall, 2010
Chosen from over 400 international sports-based youth development entities from 120 countries around the world, Beyond the Ball was the only U.S.-based award winner at the 2010 Beyond Sport Summit, an organization led by former British Prime Minister Tony Blair seeking excellence in using sport for social good.
Asked to address U.S. Congress at the Up 2 Us Summit - Fall, 2010
Beyond the Ball was invited to Washington D.C. as part of the Up 2 Us Summit to address Congress. Our very own Bitty Ball leader, ten year-old Miguel Leonardo (seated under the flags below), addressed both Houses regarding the impact Beyond the Ball has had on his life.
Community Builder of the Year - 2000
Rob and Amy Castañeda were honored by Mayor Richard M. Daley and the City of Chicago for standing up to gangs in the Little Village community.
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Owen Waters → Messages
What Is Real?
a message from Owen Waters
Sunday, 8 January, 2012 (posted 25 May, 2012)
2331 views, 2 comments - login or register to comment
What is real? What is there to hold on to?
One of the main reasons for experiencing life on Earth is to discover what is real.
We spend our lives coming here, going there, trying this and trying that. We acquire physical things and eventually let them go. Life’s experiences pass by like so much water under the bridge.
One constant in all of life’s ever-changing realities is the inner observer. This aspect of your inner self is present in all of life’s experiences, watching, learning, remembering. However, when you go even deeper than this, you reach the underlying basis of all consciousness, the awareness that, simply, you exist.
This fundamental awareness can be summarized in two words: “I am.”
The great “I Am” presence
You are one individual viewpoint of the great I Am, the consciousness of All That Is, the all-inclusive and all-embracing Infinite Being.
Consciousness is reality. Experiences may change from minute to minute, but underneath the flow of experiences lies that constant awareness, the sense of being that says, “I am.”
Life is about experiences which unfold at different locations in space and time. Space, however, is merely a construct of the Creator’s consciousness. The concept of space was created to allow an infinite variety of viewpoints to exist.
Time is also a construct of consciousness. Time enables change within space, making events and experiences possible.
Is physical matter a construct of consciousness? Matter is composed of energy, and energy, like all things in life, is a construct of consciousness.
The definition of energy
Energy is compressed consciousness.
Each unit of energy is formed by counter-rotating vortices of Intent. These vortices push together to form a tiny sphere of compressed consciousness within their center, which becomes a particle of living energy.
Intent and Love in motion are the original, fundamental principles used in Infinite Being’s creation of the universe. Like thought and feeling, these aspects of being operate as complements to each other, and yet each one can be defined as an underlying, fundamental principle. When intent, the principle of thought, and love, the principle of feeling, are set into motion, then one invokes the other. The same complementary action occurs in electromagnetism when electricity is set into motion. The electrons – particles of compressed, original Intent – invoke a complementary magnetic field within the fabric of space.
The fabric of space is created by the Love aspect of the Creator. Love is the aspect of Infinite Being which provides the supportive matrix upon which all else is built. From the point of view of physics, the fabric of space would be defined as pure, inert, magnetic energy. Or, at least, it would be if physics had gotten around to defining it yet. It used to be called the aether, but its properties were not fully understood at the time. Physics, for the most part, does not currently believe in the aether, does not currently believe in a Creator of the universe, and, as a result, has no idea why particles of energy exhibit signs of consciousness.
The original Creation
Before the original Creation occurred, Infinite Being formed an expression of itself which was to become the Creator of the universe. Then, as the One Creator, it focused its Intent, expressed its Love, and brought these two aspects of Itself into motion. All of the universe was built upon these underlying principles, which make possible the facets of Creation such as time, space, energy and matter.
A universe in motion makes possible the changes we call experience. But if life is constantly changing, then what is there to hold on to? What is unchangingly real?
Unchanging reality is to be found beneath those fundamental aspects of the Creator’s Intent and Love in motion. Infinite Being is the underlying reality. Infinite Being is all that is, it never changes. Being is pure potential, whereas doing is the acting out of that potential.
The underlying reality of Infinite Being is complete beingness. Infinite Being is real. It never changes. It always is; just is.
How do you connect with reality? By meditating, by using the affirmation, “I am Infinite Being,” you can build your connection daily to the true reality which lies within you.
When you make spirituality your number one priority at the start of each day, then daily meditation becomes a habit, something which occurs with ease. By building that inner bridge to reality, you are empowering your own potential and also helping to shift the global mind towards enlightenment.
Courtesy of Owen Waters, www.spiritualdynamics.net
kay • 25th May 2012 12:23 pm
Your articles are always so well thought-out and such beautiful reminders. Thank you, Owen, for everything you do for all of us.
LordJesusChrist • 26th May 2012 3:50 am
The Good Force be with you!
Thanks, Owen, for sharing! That is wonderful!
I believe Heaven or The New Jerusalem is Real!
Live forever and prosper!
Alleluia! Amen! ******* My Good Wisdom
Owen Waters
author views: 332295
Owen Waters is an international spiritual teacher who has helped hundreds of thousands of spiritual seekers to understand better the nature of their inner being and their infinite potential. For more than forty years, his life has focused upon gaining spiritual insights through extensive research and the development of his inner vision.
More from Owen Waters
Your Silent Secret
Whole Brain Thinking
Scanning the Future
Your Soul Connection
The Lightworker Enigma
Other Realms of Existence
Soul Awakening - Part 1 of 8 - Soul Awareness
The Emergence of Lightworkers
He Says Yoga Attracts Demons…
Soul Awakening - Part 5 of 8 - Avoiding the Time Trap
Soul Awakening - Part 4 of 8 - The Law of Creation
Books from Owen Waters
Spirituality Made Simple
Love, Light, Laughter
Owen Waters Archives
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Politics and International Relations (44)
American Political Science Review (10)
PS: Political Science & Politics (4)
Perspectives on Politics (2)
Economics & Philosophy (1)
Law & Social Inquiry (1)
Edinburgh University Press (1)
Women and Politics Section-APSA (13)
American Bar Foundation (1)
Murphy Institute Studies in Political Economy (11)
Comparative Constitutional Law and Policy (4)
Cambridge Studies in the Theory of Democracy (3)
Political Economy of Institutions and Decisions (1)
Theories of Institutional Design (1)
2 - Financial Emergencies
from I - The Role of Constitutions in Dealing with Crises
By John Ferejohn
Edited by Tom Ginsburg, University of Chicago, Mark D. Rosen, Illinois Institute of Technology, Georg Vanberg, Duke University, North Carolina
Book: Constitutions in Times of Financial Crisis
This chapter explores ways in which financial emergencies are dealt with by modern governments, by which I mean political/legal systems that constitutionally protect rights and privileges. The key feature of such systems, from my perspective, is that they can be slow to react to shocks, even those that destabilize the government or threaten the whole legal regime. A financial emergency is, arguably, an example of such a shock.
The Politics of Imperfection: The Amendment of Constitutions
John Ferejohn
Journal: Law & Social Inquiry / Volume 22 / Issue 2 / Spring 1997
Print publication: Spring 1997
12 - Secret Votes and Secret Talk
Edited by Jon Elster, Columbia University, New York
Book: Secrecy and Publicity in Votes and Debates
12 - Instituting Political Change
from PART III - PATHS OF POLITICAL CHANGE
By John Ferejohn, Stanford University
Edited by Adam Przeworski, New York University
Book: Democracy in a Russian Mirror
Print publication: 21 May 2015, pp 229-246
Modern democracy is normally conducted by elected representatives, chosen in competitive elections (where incumbents have a chance to lose). From the standpoint of the voters, elections are the (thin) connecting line between what voters want or will accept and the policies chosen by their government. But this is so only to the extent that elected officials can actually lose elections and are not able to so exploit the advantages of office as to insulate themselves from voters. From the standpoint of elected officials, elections are a matter of political life and death. To survive and have their policies persist, they have to win or at least win pretty often. Therefore, policies are chosen, in part, because officials think will help them prevail next time. One cannot of course expect governments to be very good at figuring which policies will have this effect. The connection between policies and the outcomes voters care about is complex and obscured by risk and uncertainty and, in many cases, very weak. Moreover, modern democracies are internally complex with separated powers and internal checks, making coordination on policy difficult and sometimes impossible to achieve (despite the invention of the political party). So governments get things wrong fairly often either because they cannot figure out what to do, or, cannot do actually manage to do what they know they should do. And, as a result, as long as elections really are somewhat competitive, sometimes governments lose elections.
For all its flaws, the traditional democratic conception is usually defended nowadays in the following way: the policies that work electorally are those that tend to produce good outcomes for voters. And elected officials are thought to be at least somewhat competent at finding such policies and so can be (rationally) expected to pursue them in between elections. So, even if there is a bit of noise (i.e., failed policies, electoral defeats, etc.), and even if the election motive distorts policies a bit toward short run electoral concerns, and even if electoral worries can make it hard for representatives to coordinate their actions, on balance democracy usually tends to produce outcomes acceptable to the electorate.
Program Plans for 1988 Annual Meeting
John Ferejohn, Stephen Krasner
Journal: PS: Political Science & Politics / Volume 20 / Issue 4 / Fall 1987
Print publication: Fall 1987
Journal: PS: Political Science & Politics / Volume 20 / Issue 3 / Summer 1987
Print publication: Summer 1987
5 - Two Views of the City: Republicanism and Law
Edited by Andreas Niederberger, Johann Wolfgang Goethe-University, Frankfurt, Philipp Schink, Johann Wolfgang Goethe-University, Frankfurt
Book: Republican Democracy
Published by: Edinburgh University Press
Published online: 05 October 2013
Republican political theory has been thought to have distinctive implications for law and especially for constitutional institutions and practices. A republic is supposed to pursue the common interests of its citizens and for that reason republicans have usually opposed rule by narrow groups such as monarchy or oligarchy, which would be tempted to pursue narrower objectives. Traditionally republicans have also usually opposed democracy, too – especially direct democracy of the kind practiced in Athens – on the ground that rule by a majority is a form of despotic or lawless rule. Republicans have also tended to be suspicious of liberalism because of its emphasis on private goods rather than public projects and its deprecation of duties and of shared or public interests. Nowadays, however, many republicans argue that republicanism actually requires a commitment to certain kinds of “democratic” institutions and to deliberative practices, and they see some version of democracy as consistent with assuring robust liberal protections for individual freedom.
Philip Pettit, for example, argues that law, even though it compels and coerces, is or can be emancipative for individuals. By reducing the domination of some by others, it can increase the amount of liberty or freedom enjoyed by the individuals in society. Moreover, he argues that the legal system can be so arranged, constitutionally, as to limit domination by governmental officials while permitting it sufficient power and purpose to restrain private actors from dominating others.
14 - Judicial Power
Edited by Diana Kapiszewski, University of California, Irvine, Gordon Silverstein, Robert A. Kagan, University of California, Berkeley
Book: Consequential Courts
Print publication: 08 April 2013, pp 349-362
One could think that the move from authoritarian rule to parliamentary democracy would be generally favorable to legality. There are certainly many cases of authoritarian rulers who have seen courts and legal processes as threats to their powers and insisted on subservient judges, willing to permit lawless actions as required. However, not every authoritarian regime has been hostile to legality and independent legal institutions. Indeed, Steven Holmes has argued that law and independent judges are often in the interest of authoritarian as well as democratic rulers because they permit the upward flow of information valuable to maintaining stable rule.
Whether that is so or not, it seems clear that the transition away from an authoritarian regime, insofar as it entails a break in the old legal order, can undermine the establishment of genuinely legal institutions. Many of the laws might be either new or, if old, of questionable pedigree. There may have been special deals or pacts – necessary to disband the old authoritarian system – aimed at protecting certain traditional elites from legal rules that apply to others. Moreover, judges might well have continued or at least been trained under the previous regime, so they may not have earned or deserved a high level of trust. One could hope, however, that as democratic or liberal institutions become more established, these conflicts would fade away. Perhaps; but the chapters in this volume provide reason to think that there remains a significant tension between law and democratic rule and judges are sometimes placed in a position where they must negotiate these difficult issues.
Response to Daniel Carpenter's review of A Republic of Statutes: The New American Constitution
William N. Eskridge, John Ferejohn
Journal: Perspectives on Politics / Volume 10 / Issue 3 / September 2012
We appreciate Dan Carpenter's thoughtful assessment of our book and are eager to respond to his reflections about the political theory of the republic of statutes. He is right that we did not discuss some highly entrenched statutory schemes that might well deserve small-c constitutional status as superstatutes. Although we do treat the Defense of Marriage Act as a superstatute in our chapter on the antihomosexual constitution and its disentrenchment, we might have included a chapter on the Food, Drug and Cosmetics Act of 1938 (along with the many subsequent amendments that helped shape the drug enforcement regime we have today) if we had as many original things to say about the Food and Drug Administration's (FDA's) administrative constitutionalism as Carpenter did in his book. It would have been a big chapter, too.
Reputation and Power: Organizational Image and Pharmaceutical Regulation at the FDA. By Daniel Carpenter. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010. 856p. $78.50 cloth, $35.00 paper.
Dan Carpenter's massive new study of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is a definitive study of regulatory politics and administrative behavior destined to stand alongside other classic studies of administrative agencies, such as Herbert Kaufman's The Forest Ranger (1960) or Martha Derthick's Policy Making for Social Security (1979). Like Carpenter's earlier work, Reputation and Power is marked by deep erudition, thorough scholarship, painstaking attention to detail, and a wide-ranging attention to alternative disciplinary paradigms. And it is argued with great craft, subtlety, and creativity both in developing its historical narrative and in its cogent theoretical analysis.
5 - Legislation, Planning, and Deliberation
Edited by Hélène Landemore, Yale University, Connecticut, Jon Elster
Book: Collective Wisdom
Print publication: 16 July 2012, pp 95-117
By Daniel Andler, Bryan Caplan, Jon Elster, David Estlund, John Ferejohn, Lu Hong, Hélène Landemore, Christian List, Gerry Mackie, Hugo Mercier, Josiah Ober, Gloria Origgi, Scott E. Page, Emile Servan-Schreiber, Dan Sperber, Philippe Urfalino, Adrian Vermeule
Print publication: 16 July 2012, pp vii-x
By Susan Alberts, Tamar Asadurian, Justin Blount, Anjali Thomas Bohlken, Robert D. Cooter, Rosalind Dixon, Zachary Elkins, Jon Elster, John Ferejohn, Tom Ginsburg, Ran Hirschl, Richard Holden, James Melton, Martha C. Nussbaum, Pasquale Pasquino, Randall Peerenboom, Eric A. Posner, Adam Przeworski, Neil S. Siegel, Adrian Vermeule, Chris Warshaw, Barry R. Weingast
Edited by Tom Ginsburg
Book: Comparative Constitutional Design
Published online: 05 March 2012
Print publication: 27 February 2012, pp ix-x
11 - Constitutional Adjudication, Italian Style
from Part III - Issues in Institutional Design
By John Ferejohn, Pasquale Pasquino
8 - A Theory of the Politically Independent Judiciary
By Rebecca Bill Chávez, U.S. Naval Academy, Annapolis, Maryland, John A. Ferejohn, New York University, New York, Barry R. Weingast, Stanford University, Palo Alto, California
Edited by Gretchen Helmke, University of Rochester, New York, Julio Rios-Figueroa
Book: Courts in Latin America
Print publication: 17 January 2011, pp 219-247
This chapter specifies the institutional conditions for an autonomous judiciary. It seeks to address the question, when will judges act independently of elected officials? Although scholars agree that judicial autonomy is an essential condition for the rule of law in presidential systems, no consensus exists about the circumstances under which it occurs. We argue that when the executive and legislative branches are united against the courts, the courts have few resources with which to defend an independent course, which may include arbitrating interbranch disputes and upholding rights. In contrast, when significant and sustained disagreements arise among elected officials – such as take place under divided government – judges have the ability to challenge the state and sustain an independent course, with little fear of political retribution.
We seek to demonstrate that a country's position on the judicial autonomy continuum depends on more than so-called parchment barrier guarantees of life tenure (or some other long-term length) or protections against salary reduction. Informal practices that allow elected officials to control the courts often overshadow formal (constitutional) guarantees of judicial independence. Institutionalized subconstitutional practices can shape the incentive structure facing judges so that they are unlikely to oppose government policies. These subconstitutional practices can include withholding funds from the judiciary, imposing limitations on the jurisdiction of the courts, or instituting more drastic measures such as removing judges and court packing. Unified government permits the president and congress to employ these practices or to threaten to do so to subordinate the courts.
10 - Electoral representation and the aristocratic thesis
By John Ferejohn, Stanford University; New York University, Frances Rosenbluth, Yale University
Edited by Ian Shapiro, Yale University, Connecticut, Susan C. Stokes, Yale University, Connecticut, Elisabeth Jean Wood, Yale University, Connecticut, Alexander S. Kirshner, Yale University, Connecticut
Book: Political Representation
A modern democracy is conducted by a small body of elected officials who make the laws and control the state. This fact has been taken by some to mean that modern democracy is really a kind of elite rule. In its strong form, this claim implies that modern democratic governments pursue the interests of an elite or aristocracy; the weak form claims no more than the evident fact that government is run by a relatively narrow class of people and leaves open the question of whose interests may be served by this arrangement. Strong form elite theorists do not necessarily reject the possibility that the people may have some influence in picking and choosing which parts of the elite class control government. But they typically stress how weak and ineffective such controls are, especially when it comes to getting the elite to pursue public interests. If public interests are served, on the strong account, they are served gratuitously, by leaders who happen to be publically motivated, and not because of any strong incentive leaders may have to govern for the people.
Versions of the elitist view were stated by Schumpeter years ago and have been developed in various ways by Przeworski, Manin, and Dunn. The emphases of these theories vary quite a bit but all concur in seeing elections as devices for picking an elite and not an instrument by which the people exercise real control over these leaders.
Conclusion: the Citizens' Assembly model
By John Ferejohn, Professor of Political Science; Senior Fellow of the Hoover Institution Stanford University
Edited by Mark E. Warren, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Hilary Pearse, University of British Columbia, Vancouver
Book: Designing Deliberative Democracy
Published online: 22 September 2009
Since the time of Ancient Athens, students of democracy have been skeptical that elections are a way of implementing democracy, at least if democracy requires something like government “by” the people rather than “of ” or “for” them. There are several grounds for this skepticism: first, elections may select unusual people – better, more able, or merely more ambitious leaders – and thereby exclude ordinary people from a regular role in government. Second, whether or not elected leaders are especially skillful, those elected to office tend to become a professional class with knowledge and interests separate from those of ordinary people. The Athenians themselves thought that lottery was the more democratic way to fill office, as it ensures that anyone who wanted to serve would be able to do so. Indeed, Aristotle defined democracy as a system in which people take turns ruling: where each rules and is ruled in turn (Aristotle 350 bc [1963]: 1317b).
Nowadays of course, every state is supposed to be a democracy – in the sense of drawing its authority to rule from the people – and modern reaction to this expectation has generally been to tone down expectations for democracy: to settle for electoral or representative democracy as the only feasible kind of democracy in modern circumstances. So, rather than the people ruling directly, elected elites rule on their behalf.
15 - Super-Statutes: The New American Constitutionalism
By William N. Eskridge, John A. Garver Professor of Jurisprudence Yale Law School, John Ferejohn, Senior Fellow Hoover Institution; Carolyn S. G. Munro Professor of Political Science Stanford University
Edited by Richard W. Bauman, University of Alberta, Tsvi Kahana, Queen's University, Ontario
Book: The Least Examined Branch
Carolyn Aiello was caught in a constitutional transition. Living in the Bay Area of California, Aiello supported herself as a hairdresser. But her livelihood was (temporarily) cut off when complications associated with her pregnancy required her to take a medical leave on June 21, 1972. The doctors discovered that Aiello had an ectopic pregnancy and performed surgery to terminate her pregnancy. Although she would ultimately return to work on July 28, she could not afford the loss of even a month's income. Like millions of other Americans, Aiello applied for unemployment benefits on the basis of her physical disability – but, unlike most other applicants having serious even if temporary disabilities, her claim was denied. California's unemployment compensation program excluded from its coverage disability claims based on pregnancy.
This was a state discrimination affecting thousands of working women like Aiello. Represented by San Francisco civil rights attorney Wendy Webster Williams, Aiello and three other women sued the state to overturn this discrimination in its unemployment compensation law. Their argument was that the exclusion of pregnancy-based claims from the unemployment program violated the Equal Protection Clause. Speaking for a three-judge federal court, Judge Zirpoli ruled the exclusion unconstitutional – but the United States Supreme Court reversed. It held, in Geduldig v. Aiello (1974), that pregnancy-based exclusions are not subject to heightened equal protection scrutiny and that the California exclusion was a rational means for the state to tailor its program and, essentially, save money.
8 - Judicial Independence in a Democracy: Institutionalizing Judicial Restraint
By John Ferejohn, Carolyn S. G. Munro Professor of Political Science, Stanford University; Visiting Professor of Law and Politics, New York University School of Law, Larry D. Kramer, Richard E. Lang Professor of Law and Dean, Stanford Law School
Edited by John N. Drobak, Washington University, School of Law
Book: Norms and the Law
The Constitution establishes the judiciary as a co-equal department of the federal government and protects its members from political interference by granting them life tenure and prohibiting Congress from reducing their salaries. Yet Congress is free to decide whether to create lower federal courts at all, to define their jurisdiction narrowly or widely, to establish rules of procedure, and to determine the size of the judiciary's budget. Moreover, federal courts are not only staffed by presidential nominees, they must also rely on the executive branch to enforce their judgments. From this perspective it is hard not to agree with Alexander Hamilton who noted in Federalist 78 that the judiciary, having neither purse nor sword, is the “least dangerous branch.” Hamilton, it must be said, offered this as assurance to those who feared the new constitution might establish independent and unaccountable judges as threats to liberty. But he surely worried that the complex ways in which federal judges were embedded in the political structure and their dependence on the political branches might undermine their capacity to withstand political pressures.
A contemporary observer might be forgiven for thinking, after two centuries of practice, that these concerns about the independence of the federal courts were overblown. Starting with its clever and cautious stance in Marbury v. Madison, the Supreme Court has proved more than capable of protecting its institutional powers relative to the other branches and, even more, relative to the state governments.
7 - External and internal explanation
By John Ferejohn, Department of Political Science, Stanford University
Edited by Ian Shapiro, Yale University, Connecticut, Rogers M. Smith, University of Pennsylvania, Tarek E. Masoud, Yale University, Connecticut
Book: Problems and Methods in the Study of Politics
Print publication: 09 September 2004, pp 144-164
Should the social sciences focus more than they now do on solving real (explanatory) problems and less on developing methodologies or pursuing methodological programs? Two distinct worries animate this question. One is that too many resources may be devoted to the development and refinement of methodologies and theories, while too little attention is paid to the actual things needing explanation. In this sense there may be a misallocation of social scientific resources. The other worry is that when proponents of some methodology turn to explaining a particular event or phenomenon, they tend to produce distorted accounts; they are deflected by their inordinate attention to and sympathy for their favorite method. Method-driven social science comes up with defective explanations. Proper attempts to explain things, one might think, ought to be open ended and responsive to the phenomenon to be explained and not be committed in advance to any particular explanatory methodology. Such a commitment smacks of dogmatism or a priori-ism. These complaints are often illustrated by the familiar metaphors of drunks searching under street-lamps and the law of the hammer.
My inclination is to resist the question as not quite usefully posed. The development of systematic methodologies and theories is what permits the social sciences – or particular approaches to social science – to make distinctive and sometimes valuable contributions to understanding the events that interest us.;;There are several reasons why this is the case.
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Antarctic Science (8)
Polar Record (1)
Delivering 21st century Antarctic and Southern Ocean science
M.C. Kennicutt, Y.D. Kim, M. Rogan-Finnemore, S. Anandakrishnan, S.L. Chown, S. Colwell, D. Cowan, C. Escutia, Y. Frenot, J. Hall, D. Liggett, A.J. Mcdonald, U. Nixdorf, M.J. Siegert, J. Storey, A. Wåhlin, A. Weatherwax, G.S. Wilson, T. Wilson, R. Wooding, S. Ackley, N. Biebow, D. Blankenship, S. Bo, J. Baeseman, C.A. Cárdenas, J. Cassano, C. Danhong, J. Dañobeitia, J. Francis, J. Guldahl, G. Hashida, L. Jiménez Corbalán, A. Klepikov, J. Lee, M. Leppe, F. Lijun, J. López-Martinez, M. Memolli, Y. Motoyoshi, R. Mousalle Bueno, J. Negrete, M.A. Ojeda Cárdenes, M. Proaño Silva, S. Ramos-Garcia, H. Sala, H. Shin, X. Shijie, K. Shiraishi, T. Stockings, S. Trotter, D.G. Vaughan, J. Viera Da Unha De Menezes, V. Vlasich, Q. Weijia, J.-G. Winther, H. Miller, S. Rintoul, H. Yang
Journal: Antarctic Science / Volume 28 / Issue 6 / December 2016
The Antarctic Roadmap Challenges (ARC) project identified critical requirements to deliver high priority Antarctic research in the 21st century. The ARC project addressed the challenges of enabling technologies, facilitating access, providing logistics and infrastructure, and capitalizing on international co-operation. Technological requirements include: i) innovative automated in situ observing systems, sensors and interoperable platforms (including power demands), ii) realistic and holistic numerical models, iii) enhanced remote sensing and sensors, iv) expanded sample collection and retrieval technologies, and v) greater cyber-infrastructure to process ‘big data’ collection, transmission and analyses while promoting data accessibility. These technologies must be widely available, performance and reliability must be improved and technologies used elsewhere must be applied to the Antarctic. Considerable Antarctic research is field-based, making access to vital geographical targets essential. Future research will require continent- and ocean-wide environmentally responsible access to coastal and interior Antarctica and the Southern Ocean. Year-round access is indispensable. The cost of future Antarctic science is great but there are opportunities for all to participate commensurate with national resources, expertise and interests. The scope of future Antarctic research will necessitate enhanced and inventive interdisciplinary and international collaborations. The full promise of Antarctic science will only be realized if nations act together.
A roadmap for Antarctic and Southern Ocean science for the next two decades and beyond
M.C. Kennicutt, S.L. Chown, J.J. Cassano, D. Liggett, L.S. Peck, R. Massom, S.R. Rintoul, J. Storey, D.G. Vaughan, T.J. Wilson, I. Allison, J. Ayton, R. Badhe, J. Baeseman, P.J. Barrett, R.E. Bell, N. Bertler, S. Bo, A. Brandt, D. Bromwich, S.C. Cary, M.S. Clark, P. Convey, E.S. Costa, D. Cowan, R. Deconto, R. Dunbar, C. Elfring, C. Escutia, J. Francis, H.A. Fricker, M. Fukuchi, N. Gilbert, J. Gutt, C. Havermans, D. Hik, G. Hosie, C. Jones, Y.D. Kim, Y. Le Maho, S.H. Lee, M. Leppe, G. Leitchenkov, X. Li, V. Lipenkov, K. Lochte, J. López-Martínez, C. Lüdecke, W. Lyons, S. Marenssi, H. Miller, P. Morozova, T. Naish, S. Nayak, R. Ravindra, J. Retamales, C.A. Ricci, M. Rogan-Finnemore, Y. Ropert-Coudert, A.A. Samah, L. Sanson, T. Scambos, I.R. Schloss, K. Shiraishi, M.J. Siegert, J.C. Simões, B. Storey, M.D. Sparrow, D.H. Wall, J.C. Walsh, G. Wilson, J.G. Winther, J.C. Xavier, H. Yang, W.J. Sutherland
Journal: Antarctic Science / Volume 27 / Issue 1 / February 2015
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 September 2014, pp. 3-18
Print publication: February 2015
Antarctic and Southern Ocean science is vital to understanding natural variability, the processes that govern global change and the role of humans in the Earth and climate system. The potential for new knowledge to be gained from future Antarctic science is substantial. Therefore, the international Antarctic community came together to ‘scan the horizon’ to identify the highest priority scientific questions that researchers should aspire to answer in the next two decades and beyond. Wide consultation was a fundamental principle for the development of a collective, international view of the most important future directions in Antarctic science. From the many possibilities, the horizon scan identified 80 key scientific questions through structured debate, discussion, revision and voting. Questions were clustered into seven topics: i) Antarctic atmosphere and global connections, ii) Southern Ocean and sea ice in a warming world, iii) ice sheet and sea level, iv) the dynamic Earth, v) life on the precipice, vi) near-Earth space and beyond, and vii) human presence in Antarctica. Answering the questions identified by the horizon scan will require innovative experimental designs, novel applications of technology, invention of next-generation field and laboratory approaches, and expanded observing systems and networks. Unbiased, non-contaminating procedures will be required to retrieve the requisite air, biota, sediment, rock, ice and water samples. Sustained year-round access to Antarctica and the Southern Ocean will be essential to increase winter-time measurements. Improved models are needed that represent Antarctica and the Southern Ocean in the Earth System, and provide predictions at spatial and temporal resolutions useful for decision making. A co-ordinated portfolio of cross-disciplinary science, based on new models of international collaboration, will be essential as no scientist, programme or nation can realize these aspirations alone.
Effects of temperature on heat-shock responses and survival of two species of marine invertebrates from sub-Antarctic Marion Island
S. Clusella-Trullas, L. Boardman, K.T. Faulkner, L.S. Peck, S.L. Chown
Journal: Antarctic Science / Volume 26 / Issue 2 / April 2014
This study examined high temperature survival and heat shock protein 70 (Hsp70) responses to temperature variation for two marine invertebrate species on sub-Antarctic Marion Island. The isopod Exosphaeroma gigas Leach and the amphipod Hyale hirtipalma Dana had the same tolerance to high temperature. The mean upper temperature which was lethal for 50% of the population (upper lethal temperature, ULT50) was 26.4°C for both species. However, the isopod E. gigas showed significant plasticity of ULT50, with a positive response to acclimation. In addition, the isopod had a heat shock response of Hsp70 at all acclimations, and the amount of Hsp70 protein increased significantly from basal levels upon an acute warm exposure after a cold acclimation. By contrast, the amphipod H. hirtipalma showed limited plasticity of ULT50 and no evidence for a heat shock response (failure of three different Hsp70 antibodies to bind to the extracted 70kDa proteins). Overall, these results reflect different flexibility of thermal tolerance of intertidal invertebrate species on Marion Island, with possible variation in the underlying cellular mechanisms, suggesting that warming associated with climate change may result in changes in species assemblage structure in sub-polar environments.
Inter-island dispersal of flightless Bothrometopus huntleyi (Coleoptera: Curculionidae) from the sub-Antarctic Prince Edward Island archipelago
G.C. Grobler, A.D.S. Bastos, C.T. Chimimba, S.L. Chown
Journal: Antarctic Science / Volume 23 / Issue 3 / June 2011
Bothrometopus huntleyi is a flightless weevil endemic to the volcanically-formed sub-Antarctic Prince Edward Islands archipelago that arose approximately 0.5 million years ago (m.y.a.). Since emergence, a series of volcanic and glaciation events have occurred on Marion Island, whilst Prince Edward Island, the second island constituting the archipelago, has remained largely unaffected by glaciation. Cytochrome oxidase I gene analyses indicate that major historical dispersal events in this species are linked to the geologically discrete histories of these islands and underlie the high haplotype diversity (0.995) recovered for the Prince Edward Islands archipelago. The estimated time to haplotype coalescence of ∼ 0.723 m.y.a. is in keeping with estimated dates of island emergence, and the majority of individuals appear to have descended from a relict, high-altitude population that is still present on Marion Island. The first major inter-island dispersal event occurred ∼ 0.507 m.y.a., coinciding with the oldest dated rocks on Marion Island. Apart from this early inter-island colonization, only one other between-island dispersal event was detected. The genetically discrete B. huntleyi complexes on each of the islands of the Prince Edward Islands archipelago together with the low levels of inter-island gene flow reaffirm the need to control alien invasive mice, which are restricted to Marion Island, and which prey on this weevil species.
Cryptic species, biogeographic complexity and the evolutionary history of the Ectemnorhinus group in the sub-Antarctic, including a description of Bothrometopus huntleyi, n. sp.
G.C. Grobler, A.D.S. Bastos, A.M. Treasure, S.L. Chown
The biogeography of the South Indian Ocean Province (SIP) biotas has long been controversial. Much of the discussion has been based on interpretation of species distributions, based on morphological or anatomical delimitations. However, molecular phylogenetic approaches elsewhere have recently shown that interpretations based solely on morphological data may be misleading. Nonetheless, few studies have employed molecular phylogenetic approaches to understand the biogeography of the SIP biotas. We do so here for the Ectemnorhinus group of genera, a monophyletic unit of weevils endemic to the region. We use mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase I DNA sequence data to reconstruct relationships among 13 species and 22 populations in the genera Palirhoeus, Bothrometopus and Ectemnorhinus. On the basis of this analysis we find little support for separating the genus Palirhoeus from Bothrometopus, and little support for the morphologically-based species groups currently recognized within Bothrometopus. Using a molecular clock we show that dispersal among islands probably took place against the prevailing wind direction. These data also support a previous hypothesis of radiation of the epilithic genera Bothrometopus and Palirhoeus during the Pliocene/early Pleistocene, but reject the hypothesis that the genus Ectemnorhinus radiated following the last glacial maximum. We show that Bothrometopus parvulus (C.O. Waterhouse) on the Prince Edward Islands comprises two species that are not sister taxa. We name the second species Bothrometopus huntleyi n. sp. and provide a description thereof.
Conserving pattern and process in the Southern Ocean: designing a Marine Protected Area for the Prince Edward Islands
A.T. Lombard, B. Reyers, L.Y. Schonegevel, J. Cooper, L.B. Smith-Adao, D.C. Nel, P.W. Froneman, I.J. Ansorge, M.N. Bester, C.A. Tosh, T. Strauss, T. Akkers, O. Gon, R.W. Leslie, S.L. Chown
Journal: Antarctic Science / Volume 19 / Issue 1 / March 2007
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 February 2007, pp. 39-54
South Africa is currently proclaiming a Marine Protected Area (MPA) in the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) of its sub-Antarctic Prince Edward Islands. The objectives of the MPA are to: 1) contribute to a national and global representative system of MPAs, 2) serve as a scientific reference point to inform future management, 3) contribute to the recovery of the Patagonian toothfish (Dissostichus eleginoides), and 4) reduce the bird bycatch of the toothfish fishery, particularly of albatrosses and petrels. This study employs systematic conservation planning methods to delineate a MPA within the EEZ that will conserve biodiversity patterns and processes within sensible management boundaries, while minimizing conflict with the legal toothfish fishery. After collating all available distributional data on species, benthic habitats and ecosystem processes, we used C-Plan software to delineate a MPA with three management zones: four IUCN Category Ia reserves (13% of EEZ); two Conservation Zones (21% of EEZ); and three Category IV reserves (remainder of EEZ). Compromises between conservation target achievement and the area required by the MPA are apparent in the final reserve design. The proposed MPA boundaries are expected to change over time as new data become available and as impacts of climate change become more evident.
Invertebrate body sizes from Marion Island
Richard D. Mercer, A.G.A. Gabriel, J. Barendse, D.J. Marshall, S.L. Chown
Body size was measured for 67 of the approximately 120 invertebrate species on Marion Island. These include more than 60% of the 29 acarine families, and more than 80% of the remaining terrestrial invertebrate species. Thus the data are regarded as representative of the entire invertebrate fauna of sub-Antarctic, Marion Island. Length–mass and fresh–dry mass relationships were calculated for orders, families and species to provide a means of estimating body size parameters for species in collections and those which are known from only a few specimens. A comparison of the regression slopes for the different taxonomic ranks indicates that it is better to use regressions from the lowest possible taxonomic level for prediction of body mass. Differences between length–mass relationships for Marion Island insects and continental assemblages raises the question as to the applicability of continental regressions to sub-Antarctic species. This study provides a useful means for estimating body size parameters for Antarctic and sub-Antarctic invertebrates and provides baseline data on an important species trait that seems to be changing with local and global environmental changes.
Priorities for terrestrial Antarctic research
S.L. Chown, W. Block, P. Vernon, P. Greenslade
Journal: Polar Record / Volume 33 / Issue 186 / July 1997
Habitat use and diet as biogeographic indicators for subantarctic Ectemnorhinini (Coleoptera: Curculionidae)
S.L. Chown
Journal: Antarctic Science / Volume 1 / Issue 1 / March 1989
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 May 2004, pp. 23-30
Most of the species in the Ectemnorhinin are cryptogam feeders, angiosperm feeders representing a minority. It is hypothesized that this dearth of angiosperm feeders is due to previous climatic conditions, which precluded angiosperm herbivory, but allowed for the exploitation of a diverse cryptogamic flora, and that only with the post-glacial warm-up of the Subantarctic has angiosperm herbivory become possible. When examined in the light of the Quaternary history of the South Indian Ocean Province islands, evidence obtained from a study of the habitat use, diet and morphology of species within the tribe supports this hypothesis.
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Hungary for goals (photo: DBU)
September 20th, 2017 2:09 pm| by Christian W
If the Danish women’s national football team is affected by the very public conflict with the national football association DBU, they certainly didn’t show it on the pitch.
In a game that was close to being cancelled due to the conflict, Denmark thrashed Hungary 6-1 in Györ in their first 2019 World Cup Qualifier last night.
Sanne Troelsgaard led the way with a hat-trick, while Nadia Nadim, Pernille Harder and Nicoline Sørensen also found the back of the net.
The win puts the Danes top of Group 4 on goal difference ahead of rivals Sweden, who they take on next month in Gothenburg. The other teams in the group are Croatia and Ukraine.
Mikkel’s moment
The Danish cycling talent Mikkel Bjerg absolutely destroyed the competition at the Under-23 time trial World Cup in Bergen, Norway, held over the weekend. Despite being just 18, Bjerg rode the 37.2 kilometres in just 47 minutes and six seconds, over a minute better than US runner-up Brandon McNulty. Reigning Euro champion and fellow Dane, Mikkel Asgreen, came in seventh.
The Danish men’s badminton doubles team of Mathias Boe and Carsten Mogensen won the Korea Open by beating second-seeded Marcus Gideon and Kevin Sukamuljo of Indonesia in three sets, 21-19, 19-21, 21-15. The top-seeded Danes also won in Korea in 2009 and 2014 and now have 16 Super Series triumphs to their name. In related news, Danish badminton legend Morten Frost has stepped down as the technical head of the Malaysian badminton association after two years in the position.
Lord Popular
After a sluggish start to his career in Rosenborg, Danish striker Nicklas Bendtner has begun scoring goals in earnest and now has 12 league goals to his name – good enough to be ranked fourth in the Norwegian Eliteserien. He’s also been a commercial success for the Norwegian stalwarts, who have cashed in on Bendtner’s rising popularity. The clubs merchandise shop has sold Bendtner jerseys to the tune of 1.4 million kroner so far – so a far cry from his woeful days at Juventus, which claimed never to have sold a single Bendtner top.
Paralympic paramount
The sports confederation of Denmark, DIF, has announced that it has assumed responsibility for Danish participation in the Paralympics and has put the sport on a par with traditional sports. Until now, DIF had only organised the Danish Olympic participation, while Parasport Danmark had controlled the Danish participation at Paralympics. Parasport Danmark’s head Niels Christiansen was “very pleased” that parasport was now on equal terms with the traditional Olympic Games.
Sports News in Brief: Bahrain double, bad rain trouble
Sports News in Brief: FCK kick off Europa League campaign with stalemate
Sports News in Brief: Under-21s lethal against Lithuania
Battling Danes lose Euro 2017 final to brilliant Dutch
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HomeExtended: Telecommunication Relocation Work between Victoria Park Avenue and Birchmount Road
Extended: Telecommunication Relocation Work between Victoria Park Avenue and Birchmount Road
What Work is Taking Place?
Crews will continue to relocate and upgrade existing overhead and underground telecommunication between Victoria Park Avenue and Birchmount Road, as part of construction of the future surface section for the Eglinton Crosstown LRT.
Telecom work commenced in February and has been extended until the end of the year (Fall/Winter 2018).
Work began mid-February and will continue until the end of 2018.
Time: work will be performed between the hours of 7 am and 11 pm, seven days a week.
Note: Unexpected circumstances (weather, equipment failure, etc.) may also change the above interruption plans or prolong the interruption. If this occurs, we will endeavour to provide reasonable notice.
If overnight work is required, we will notify the public in advance and monitor activities throughout.
Work zones will be erected between Victoria Park Avenue and Birchmount Road, as well as on the east side of Victoria Park Avenue, north of Eglinton Avenue East for approximately 75 metres.
Nearby businesses and residents can expect noise from excavators, bobcats, trucks, and other construction equipment caused by utilities relocation activity.
For safety purposes, fencing will be erected around the work zones.
Pedestrians and road users can expect delays when travelling through the work zone.
As always, please take care when travelling near work sites.
Traffic and Pedestrian Impacts
Intermittent lane reductions may be required on Eglinton Avenue East while crews set-up and/or demobilize.
The actual work will take place within the public boulevard, off the roadway.
There may be occurrences where a shoulder is narrowed and a traffic protection barrier is placed to accommodate safe working conditions.
Temporary pedestrian re-routing around work zones may be necessary to accommodate this work.
Pedestrian access will be maintained.
TTC Impacts
Relocation and re-routing of bus stops is done in consultation with TTC to ensure construction can continue safely while minimizing impact on the community and customers.
Sign up for e-mail updates at http://www.thecrosstown.ca/sign-up or download the aCrosstown traffic app to get real-time traffic and transit information for the Eglinton corridor.
For more information, please contact Phil Rodriques at the East Community Office.
Thank you for your continued patience as we work to build this important project.
Please support your local businesses during construction.
Disponible en Français.
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Riff Notes
Featured Audios
WRATH PASSION - Music Featured On Soundtrack For DVD Release Horror Film, The Back Room
December 6, 2010, 8 years ago
news life in black wrath passion dvd
BW&BK; has received the following press release:
Music by Norwegian Black Metallers WRATH PASSION is featured on the soundtrack of The Back Room, the horror film that has recently seen its DVD release in the USA and Canada. Produced by 3DT Productions, The Back Room pays homage to the Grindhouse Thrillers popularized in New York City in the 1970?s, and which have recently seen a resurgence in popularity thanks to film makers like Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriquez. The film is a disturbing, gore-filled journey into the mind of a serial killer, whilst the soundtrack uses heavy metal and industrial music from Wrath Passion as well as CONTROL THE CHAOS and I AM THE MESSENGER to enhance the frightening visual scenes.
Wrath Passion was formed by Daniel Markussen in Lofoten, Norway, on the 7th July 2007 , as a means to express his own unique understanding of life - the name Wrath Passion for instance is, according to Markussen, simply an anagram for "Worship Satan". The band’s line up today is formed of two members, Markussen, who plays all instruments, and vocalist Anton van Niekerk (VERKRAG). Layers of hidden, or occult, knowledge are used to create an atmosphere in Wrath Passion's music that is blacker and deeper than mere Satanism. But Markussen himself is an intense and committed musician who never loses sight of the fact that it is the music itself that is important, and it is this combination of sinister atmosphere and musical skill that makes Wrath Passion's music an ideal choice for the darker genre of film.
The band’s involvement with the film started in March of 2010 when 3DT’s Tim Stover, who, having heard some of the band’s music, contacted Markussen about the possibility of using some of Wrath Passion's music, and a couple of months later chose the track 'Black Hole' to feature in The Back Room. The music for 'Black Hole' is written and performed by Markussen, whilst the lyrics and vocals are performed by van Niekerk. The track is also expected to be included on an upcoming album from Wrath Passion . More information about Wrath Passion can be found on the band’s website here.
Below you can see the official video for the Wrath Passion track 'Black Hole'. The trailer for The Back Room is available here (note that is contains scenes of blood, violence and nudity).
SABATON – “Great War” (Nuclear Blast)
GREYSTONE CANYON Premiere "Path We Stray"
VADER - Thy Messenger
July 13, 2019, 2 days ago
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TIMO TOLKKI’S AVALON – Return To Eden
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SWEET OBLIVION - Sweet Oblivion
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EQUITY - Financial Metal.
July 9, 2019, 5 days ago
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BLAZON STONE - Hymns Of Triumph And Death
July 4, 2019, 10 days ago
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CONCRETE FUNERAL – Ultimum Judicium
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VALE OF PNATH - Accursed
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MIREPLANER – A Mountain Of Saola Hooves
June 30, 2019, 14 days ago
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MAJESTICA - Above The Sky
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HELLOWEEN – Keeper Of The Seven Keys: The Legacy / Gambling With The Devil
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UK Release Date 1st June 2017
Director Patty Jenkins
Starring GAL GADOT Chris Pine
Certificate 12A
Reviewer Jo
I hate superhero movies. I cannot think of one I have actually enjoyed since the first Iron Man, which is now almost ten years old (!). My expectations of modern superhero movies are that I will be bored (Avengers, Batman (except Michael Keaton/Chris Nolan ones) Superman, Spiderman etc. etc.) disappointed (Suicide Squad) or really really angry that I’ve spent money on the ‘experience’ (Batman VS Superman). So I admit t’was with heavy heart and lowest expectations that I approached Patty Jenkins’ handling of the origin story of the first female superhero movie since…Supergirl??? I was left completely entertained by a film that, for all of its superhero limits, is entertaining, intelligent and heartfelt. Gal Gadot is intoxicating and Jenkins can more than handle the plus $100 mil budget usually reserved for those with penises. Wonder Woman is surprising, boisterous and captivating and for once I am eager for the inevitable sequels.
We begin our story as our heroine Diana (Gal Gadot) receives a gift from Bruce Wayne (who?) and casts her mind back to her childhood on the utopian, all female island of Themyscira. The women on this island are warriors, Amazonians who have fought battles to stop the God of War, Aries, killing all mankind. Diana is a wilful little girl who is desperate to learn to the fight but is constantly stopped by her mother Hillpolyta (Connie Nielson exuding charm and strength). Her aunt Antiope, the general (the ever brilliant Robin Wright) and their greatest fighter however secretly trains Diana and we see her becoming a great fighter. As her strength grows in one battle with her aunt she realises she is more than strong, she has powers within her that she must now learn to use. Captain Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) arrives through a secret portal out of the sky (yep) and crashes into the sea. Diana saves him but he is quickly followed by German Warships and a battle with the women ensues. Trevor gets hit with the old truth rope and thus our innocent Diana begins to learn about the world war and goes off with Steve, against her mother’s wishes to defeat Aries via the First World War front. Got all that?
As an eight year old I would dress up as Wonder Woman and chase the boys around my East London council estate. I LOVED that outfit and I loved her. How lucky I was to have such a strong, honourable role model as a little girl. Cut to 2017 and my daughter likes dressing up as a princess. She is only three though so I can knock that right out of her (not literally, please don’t call social services) and helping me do that is Gal Gadot as Wonder Woman. She is simply stunning, it is a strong but vulnerable performance. Is she Meryl Streep? No, but could Meryl convincingly look like she could stride across a battlefield and kick some men out of the way to save a village. No. But Gal Gadot sure can. Like the male actors in films in this genre her body is powerful and she owns it. I didn’t once doubt her physicality. Having never seen a man before Diana sure as hell isn’t going to be told what to do by one and there is something very pleasurable about watching her do what the hell she wants. In fact I must admit when she first came out in the ‘get up’ and started kicking ass I actually burst into tears I was so happy to finally see a female portrayed like that on screen. This actually happened a few times throughout the film, although of course it’s probably because I have my period.
Diana’s sidekick, Steve Trevor, is the always charming Chris Pine. Gadot and Pine have great chemistry and he plays the gentle digs (and they really are chaps, calm down!) against boys very well. Unlike most females in modern superhero films Pine has a real character (!) and has a lot of ‘hero’ moments. More of an Indy/Marianne and Superman/Lois kinda vibe than a hot girl scientist tied to chair or falling out of a window kinda vibe. There is a great scene where Pine is naked and Diana, having never seen a man takes a good long look at him before pointing at one thing with curiosity – his enormous watch. Snigger.
Talking of Indiana Jones I reckon that’s where Danny Huston and Elena Anaya got the inspiration for their evil Nazis from, they are verging on pantomimic and that is a damn shame because I love Danny Huston. A lot. They are fun at times but not the best parts of the film for sure. Said Taghmaoui, Ewan Bremner and Eugene Brave Rock all give good sidekick and, I will hand it to Jenkins, for the short time they are on screen they all have developed small arcs and I actually gave a toss about what they were doing. Lucy Davis is also great fun as Steve’s secretary and one suspects Diana’s future sidekick and David Thewlis is always wonderful.
Despite making some uncomfortable, I feel setting this movie in the First World War was an inspired choice. Firstly cinematically it is of course a perpetually dramatic landscape and a superhero movie within a period setting personally I found more satisfying than those in modern times. It allows Jenkins to play with a heroine that is as baffled and against war as the majority of us are. We see through her eyes the complete and utter pointlessness of war. At the beginning she has a childlike simplicity of good and evil and the more our Steve tries to explain and make her understand why some of these atrocities have to happen the more ridiculous they sound spoken aloud. It is Diana who can see clearest. As Diana’s mother says to her when as a child she is keen to go into battle ‘don’t hope for war’. A scene that truly illustrates the difference between Diana and her male superhero pals was after saving a village from Nazis, Jenkins shows Diana humbly shaking hands and smiling with the grateful villagers, as her powers increase as does her desire to help and her ability to empathise with mankind. Just like Batman.
I am going to wrap up by highlighting some of the reviews for Wonder Woman that veer between bordering on and downright offensive. I won’t name names but a certain male journalist from a broadsheet no less was ‘baffled’ by the line ‘men are essential for procreation but when it comes to pleasure, unnecessary’. Well now that is simply a biological fact (for both sexes as it happens). He also refers to the island the women live on as a ‘Sapphic utopia’. Eh? That isn’t the only review to refer to Themiscyra as an 'island of lesbians' - there are a few. Another raises the pertinent question as to why Diana’s ‘jugs aren’t bigger’. I mean come on Jenkins? Why haven’t you given her bigger tits, call yourself a director? This same reviewer said he was hoping for a breeze so he could get an ‘up skirt shot’. Another describes the appointment of Patty Jenkins as merely politically correct compared to the genius of Zach Snyder and the worst of all is the complaint of the lack of ‘kinkiness’ as we all know Wonder Woman was well into bondage, that was her key appeal. These aren’t websites with small amounts of followers either; these are ‘respectable’ sites. I don’t recall needing to talk about the appearance of Ben Affleck to discuss the shortcomings of Batman v Superman. Reviews like those mentioned just go to show how needed female led films are, enough so that it just becomes normality. Jenkins is only the second female director in history to direct a movie with a budget bigger than $100 million. Wonder Woman is currently top of the box office both here and in the US. I’ll just leave that here as I go find my Wonder Woman costume.
For me as a female, watching this incarnation of Wonder Woman is a like finding a new best friend, one that you didn’t realise how much you really needed until now. As much as I am excited for my daughter to watch it I am also thrilled I can take my six year son to see this well executed and performed action movie with a heart led by the inimitable Gal Gadot. Plotholes and dodgy CGI aside, it heavily outstrips the most recent DC outings. Wonder Woman, take a bow.
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Heart and craft reshapes lives
More in Features:
Andrew Kitchener – breeder, farmer, hunter… guide June 20, 2019
Life by design April 20, 2019
Perfect match, right mix, good cheer March 20, 2019
Maree Louise Underfashions sits unobtrusively among a cluster of retailers in the heart of Papakura, South Auckland. It’s been there 26 years but is no ordinary underwear shop. That’s because for decades, owner and corsetiere, Maree Kay has specialised in catering for breast cancer patients fitting them with a prosthesis after a mastectomy.
Her particular service requires understanding and sensitivity, compassion and encouragement.
“When women come in for that first prosthesis six weeks after their operation they are pretty vulnerable,” Maree says. “But what joy when they leave with a well-made, properly fitted prosthesis; it’s a real confidence booster which also comes with some tears, usually of relief. We always have tissues and plenty of hugs handy.”
Maree says for many years she was accustomed to clients saying, ‘you have no idea what it’s like’.
“And, despite my cousin and my grandmother both having had mastectomies, I would think to myself, ‘they are so right, I don’t know’.”
But then came the day when Maree did know. She was diagnosed with breast cancer 27 years ago at the age of 50.
“Prior to that friends would say ‘and, what would you do if you found you had breast cancer?’ I’d reply, ‘well, they’re not cutting off my breast’. But, you know, when I did learn the bad news, I couldn’t get to hospital fast enough.”
Like her clients Maree’s bras are fitted with prostheses and nobody would know. However, she is adamant there are few places that carry out the job like her staff, Robyn Haines, who has worked with her for the best part of 14 years and machinist, June Brown and part timer, Dianne French.
“The easy way is to just slip the prosthesis into a specially designed pocket in the bra but if this isn’t stitched into place the prosthesis can ride up and become uncomfortable.
“The weight difference on either side must also be taken into account; it requires bra straps to be at variable lengths. Failing to make the adjustment can result in sideways slip.
“Fortunately, June is a wonderful machinist, and Robyn is highly skilled so every prosthesis fitted here goes out properly adjusted and stitched into place.”
Maree says sadly, her trade is slipping away through lack of training and interest. “There’s no real training of the sort I had and young women today don’t see this as a career but if they did they would find it so rewarding.
“On the other hand, my granddaughter has been working here with me on Saturdays and learning such a lot. It is lovely to see her genuine interest and her compassion for our clients.”
In addition to her retail business, Maree also supplies the Manukau Super Clinic with temporary soft dacron prostheses free of charge.
“When women leave the clinic after a mastectomy, the wound is still tender and a permanent prosthesis cannot be fitted for six weeks. But no one likes feeling lopsided – it does affect balance – or leaving with clothing that clearly shows the absence of a breast. These temporary prostheses, which we make here, just fit inside a regular bra to assist with balance and looks.”
Despite still working six days a week Maree is reluctant to take time off – “I’ll just keep on going. I don’t think about the future. There are too many women who still need Maree Louise.”
Corsetry Career No Easy Road
Corsetieres aren’t what they used to be maintains Maree Kay, whose career in the lingerie business began in 1958.
After growing up in Oratia, West Auckland, she left school and at 15 was working in the corsetry department at the former George Court department store in Karangahape Rd.
“In those days there was corsetry and there was underwear; the departments were entirely separate. The word lingerie didn’t really come in until a few years later.”
As part of her employment Maree attended an intensive two week training course as a corsetiere at the nearby Berlei School, Berlei being a leading lingerie company in its day with the brand still surviving today.
But anyone who thought this would be the end of the story – corsetiere then, corsetiere now – has probably never known, or has forgotten, the whims that can take a young woman adventuring.
Two years into her job Maree and friend “decided to leave home”. “When I say ‘home’ I mean Auckland. I was living at the YWCA hostel in Queen Street when my friend and I thought Wellington was the place for us. So, off we went.
“My first job there was at Adams Bruce and what an eye opener it was; the girls just weren’t as genteel as those behind the counter at George Courts and it took some adjusting. As a result it wasn’t long before I was back in corsetry this time at long time Wellington department store, Kirkcaldie & Staines.”
The next few years brought marriage, children and a fresh career – driving taxis.
“I had the opportunity to buy a Wellington taxi so I did, working it part-time while my two boys were young. It was very different from today.
“Women weren’t allowed to work at night; we were restricted to the hours between 1 hour before sunrise and half an hour after sunsets. The problem was that at 8pm all the men knocked off for dinner and there was hardly a taxi on the road!”
Although Maree soon moved into admin’ at the taxi company she says she enjoyed the driving especially in an era when there were few problem customers.
“I also used my taxi, a black Valiant, for weddings and that was always a pleasant change.”
As time went by Maree and her family returned to Auckland and in 1978 bought a dairy in Rawhiti Road, One tree Hill. “Later we bought the shop next door and that was a mixed bag – books, haberdashery and woollens!”
With the break-up of her first marriage, Maree started again returning to her stock and trade – corsetry, working first as underwear buyer at Milnes, Remuera, and then as buyer in the corsetry department of the former Rendells chain.
“I then did a stint at Natural Wear, the company which initially brought in prostheses from the USA. This sparked an interest and in 1986 I set up my own shop in Onehunga Mall.
“That was a time when truly beautiful lingerie was made here in New Zealand and there were shops such as the former Bennett & Bain dealing solely in underwear and nightwear; all very feminine and romantic.
“I was doing okay until the local mayor turned the main street into a mall. Farmers [department store] left Onehunga and business generally died. Eventually I closed the shop.”
Although she remained working in the industry, including for a time at Gardner Fashions in Pukekohe where she met her now assistant Robyn Haines, Maree was keen to have her own shop. In 1992 she found premises on Great South Rd in Papakura and the, two years later, moved into the shop next door.
“I’ve been here ever since continuing to watch the evolving face of lingerie and underwear in New Zealand. Fabrics and styles have changed, mostly for the better and there is an ever-increasing variety or under garments. Night wear has become more practical and some pieces can even double as daywear.’
But Maree’s heart is in her work with breast cancer patients and survivors. Every element of her fitting service is focused on boosting their self-esteem and making them comfortable not only with their new prosthesis but with their body.
“The best reward is seeing these women survive and take on life again with vigour and conviction. I wouldn’t swap that pleasure for anything.”
By Helen Perry
Maree Kay
Maree Louise Underfashions
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"Molecular Tectonics III : The Simultaneous Use of H-Bonding and Charge-Charge Interactions For the Self-Assembly of Fumaric Acid and Cyclic Bisamidinium Into One- and Two- Dimensional Molecular Networks"
O. FELIX, M. W. HOSSEINI, A. DE CIAN, J. FISCHER, Angew. Chem. Int. Natl. Ed. Engl. 1997, 36 102-104.
Abstract : Self-assembling of complementary dianionic and dicationic tetrahydrogen bond donors and acceptors leading to a- and b-networks in the solid state was achieved using both directionally controlled hydrogen bonding and ion pairing electrostatic interactions.
"Molecular Tectonics IV : Molecular Nretworks Based on Hydrogen Bonding and Elecrostatic Interactions"
O. FELIX, M. W. HOSSEINI, A. DE CIAN, J. FISCHER, Tetrahedron Lett., 1997, 38, 1755-1758.(download .pdf)
Abstract : Whereas diprotonated 1 (1,2-Bis(2'-tetrahydropyrimidyl)ethane) forms a discrete exobinuclear complex with a dihapto mode of hydrogen bonding with 4-methylbenzoate anion 2- in the solid state, with 4,4'-biphenyldicarboxylate 3 2- an a-network composed of 1-2H+ dication and 32- dianion interconnected through strong hydrogen bonds and arranged in an alternating manner was obtained. The interconnection of the linear chains by water molecules affords a b-network.
"Molecular Tectonics V : Molecular Recognition in the Formation of Molecular Networks Based on Hydrogen Bonding and Electrostatic Interactions"
Abstract : The formation of a-molecular networks based on dihapto mode of H-bonding was investigated in the solid state using bis-cyclic amidinium dications and acetylenedicarboxylate dianion. It has been demonstrated that the formation of networks depends strongly on the structure of the components. A proper disposition of H-bond donor and acceptor sites indeed leads to the formation of infinite molecular assemblies in the crystalline phase.
"A Molecular Approach to Organic Solids : Synthesis of Phenyl Di- and Tri-Carboxamidines"
O. FELIX, M. W. HOSSEINI, A. DE CIAN, J. FISCHER, New J. Chem., 1997, 21, 285-288.
Abstract : Benzene di- and tri-amidines 2 and 3 were prepared by treatment with HCl and NH3 of 1,4-dicyanobenzene and 1,3,5-tricyanobenzene, respectively. The cyclic analogue 4 was synthesised at 140 °C by mixing the mono tosylate salt of 1,3-propanediamine with 1,4-dicyanobenzene. The solid state structure of the hydrochloride salt of the latter (4-2HCl) was analyzed.
"Molecular Tectonics VI : Self-Assembly of Convex and Concave Molecular Tectons by Inclusion Processes into Linear Molecular Array in the Solid State"
F. HAJEK, M. W. HOSSEINI, E. GRAF, A. DE CIAN, J. FISCHER, Angew. Chem. Int. Natl. Ed. Engl. 1997, 36, 1760-1762.
Abstract : An hollow molecular module (koiland) based on the double fusion of two p-allylcalix[4]arenes by two silicon atoms was obtained. The self-assembly of koilands into an a-network (koilate) based on the connection of koilands by linear molecular connectors was achieved in the solid state and characterised by X-ray analysis.
"Design and Synthesis of Porphyrines Bearing Catechols"
C. DREXLER, M. W. HOSSEINI, A. DE CIAN, J. FISCHER, Tetrahedron Lett., 1997, 38, 2993-2996.(download .pdf)
Abstract : Th e synthesis of meso-tetraarylporphyrines bearing 1-4 catechoylamid groups was achieved. Among the four new compounds prepared, the structure of the disubstituted ligand was elucidated in the solid state by an X-ray analysis.
"Bipyridine Based Exoditopic Ligands : Synthesis and Structural Analysis of Homobinuclear Ruthenium Complexes"
C. KAES, M. W. HOSSEINI, A. DE CIAN, J. FISCHER, Tetrahedron Lett., 1997, 38, 3901-3904.(download .pdf)
Abstract : The synthesis of new macrocyclic ligands based on 2,2'-bipyridine unites interconnected at the 4 and 4' positions by alkyl chains was achieved. Homobinuclear RuII complexes were formed and the solid state structure of one of the diastereoisomers was investigated by X-ray analysis.
"Design, Synthesis and Structural analysis of Exoditopic Macrocyclic Ligands Based On Bipyridine Units"
Abstract : The synthesis of new unsymmetrical and symmetrical macrocycles based on 2,2'-bipyridine units bearing two or four phenyl groups at the 6 and 6' positions was achieved by an oxidative coupling reaction using 1,2-dibromoethane and organolithium derivatives of bipyridine. Among all new compounds prepared, two of them were structurally analysed in the solid state by X-ray diffraction.
"Multicavitands V : Synthesis and X-ray Analysis of Unsymmetrical Linear Koilands Based on the Double Fusion of two Different Calix[4]arenes by two Silicon Atoms"
F. HAJEK, E. GRAF, M. W. HOSSEINI, A. DE CIAN, J. FISCHER, Tetrahedron Lett., 1997, 38, 4555-4558.(download .pdf)
Abstract : Unsymmetrical hollow molecular modules possessing two cavities oriented divergently were prepared by fusing two different calix[4]arene derivatives with two silicon atoms. Several of the compounds obtained were characterised by X-ray analysis.
"Probing the Peristatic Chirality Alkaline Cations : A NMR Study of Alkaline Borocryptates"
E. GRAF, R. GRAFF, M. W. HOSSEINI, C. HUGUENARD, F. TAULELLE, J. C. S. Chem. Comm. 1997, 1459-1460.(download. pdf)
Abstract : Upon treatment of the macrocycli c compound 1 bearing two catecholate moieties with equimolar amounts of B(OH)3 and aqueous NH3 in a H2O-EtOH mixture, the ammonium inclusion complex 2 was obtained exclusively. The latter was studied both in solution and in the solid state. The following selectivity sequence NH4+>Na+>Cs+ in CD3OD solution was obtained. Furthermore, the ammonium ion complex 2 was found to be more stable than the ([222], NH4+) complex by at least 3 orders of magnitude.
"Borocryptands : Synthesis and Strctural Analysis of a Lithium Borocryptate"
F. BOCKSTAHL, E. GRAF, M. W. HOSSEINI, D. SUHR, A. DE CIAN, J. FISCHER, Tetrahedron Lett., 1997, 38, 7539-7542.(download .pdf)
Abstract : A new lithium receptor based on the combination of the [11] macrocyclic core and two catechol units was designed and prepared. The binding ability of the ligand towards boron and lithium was demonstrated in solution by NMR and in the solid sta te by an X-ray analysis o f the lithiumborocryptate.
"Synthesis and Structural Analysis of a Exo-ditopic Macrocyclic Ligand Bearing 2,2'- bipyridine Units Interconnected by Silane Spacers and of its Binuclear Ruthenium Complex"
C. KAES, M. W. HOSSEINI, A. DE CIAN, J. FISCHER, J. C. S. Chem. Comm. 1997, 2229-2230.(download .pdf)
Abstract : The synthesis and structural analysis of a macrocyclic exo-ditopic ligand bearing two 2,2'-bipyridine units interconnected at the 4 and 4' positions by two -(CH2)2Si(CH2)2- spacers and of its acyclic analogue was achieved. For both compounds ruthenium homobinuclear complexes were prepared. In the case of the complex obtained with the cyclic ligand, both diastereoisomers were separated and the structure of the meso form was elucidated by X-ray analysis.
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Tory candidates named in 316 ridings — far more than NDP, Liberal party – National
OTTAWA — Hoping to take power away from the Liberals in this fall’s election, the Conservatives are well ...
OTTAWA — Hoping to take power away from the Liberals in this fall’s election, the Conservatives are well ahead of the governing party in nominating candidates hoping to win seats in the House of Commo ...
At least 18 migrant kids under the age of two were kept from parents: Dem report – National
Democrats revealed distressing new details Friday about migrant children separated from families as four ...
Democrats revealed distressing new details Friday about migrant children separated from families as four of the party’s star freshmen prepared to tell a House committee about the squalid conditions th ...
Acosta resigning from role as Labor Secretary amid fallout from Epstein deal – National
U.S. Labor Secretary Alex Acosta is resigning from his position after a week of criticism over his role i ...
U.S. Labor Secretary Alex Acosta is resigning from his position after a week of criticism over his role in brokering a plea deal with financier Jeffrey Epstein in 2008.President Donald Trump announced ...
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Ohio and Wisconsin Reject High-Speed Rail
The two state's incoming Republican governors, John Kasich of Ohio and Scott Walker of Wisconsin both swore to oppose high-speed rail for their states. Getting their wish, the $1.2 billion they had been promised is now being redistributed among the 13 other states with rail projects in the works. This unfortunate news is however good news for the rest of the country. Building high-speed lines in these states would eventually connect them to a larger network with Chicago as the Hub City. Other connections would be from Milwaukee to Madison to Minneapolis/St. Paul which would then integrate to a whole Midwestern network of rail systems. Ohio would have built a $400 million route traveling diagonally across the state from cleveland, through Columbus, then on to Cincinnati. There would however be no initial link to the Chicago hub which would include a link down to Kansas City and St. Louis or Western Pennsylvania, but that doesn't mean future links to the midwestern network were not planned.
High-Speed Rail in Japan
High-Speed Rail in Taiwan
Sources speculate that the new Republican governors were opposed to receiving the money mostly on an anti- Washington- spending basis, which was the central narrative of the midterm election. This rebellion of course only hurt their states in the long run, leaving themselves less competitive and disconnected from large quantities of human capital set to drive the economies of the Midwestern Megaregion.
The money is now being redistributed to states that are willing to cooperate with Washington, and invest in their own infrastructure. By rejecting the funds they have not removed any tax burden from their state. The money promised was grant money not loan money so no matter what the outcome, it had to be spent. In the long run this network will grow and grow connecting itself to the greater midwest, the Northeast corridor and southern regions.
Check out Next American City for more.
Labels: Polity
High-Speed Rail, Americas Next Frontier in Transportation
The Government and Amtrak are finally making moves to improve the nations fast growing transportation issues. With the congested transportation network of the growing Megaregion referred to as the North East Corridor, current systems can not handle the level of projected growth the region will experience over the next 20 years. Intercity transportation is becoming an increasingly crucial factor in the economic growth and stability of cities far and between D.C and Baltimore.
In September Amtrak unveiled its $117 billion high-speed rail plan for the Northeast Corridor. Last wednesday a panel began tallying up the potential economic benefit to the Philadelphia region. Some areas will benefit tremendously such as Market East, with a new HSR terminal planned for east market street. The terminal will jump start economic development along the corridor. In the past, large influxes of cash, mostly federal dollars have spurred earlier development along the corridor like the Gallery, the present Market East Station, and the current expansion of the Convention Center. High-Speed rail could be the massive capital event the city has been waiting for, providing an estimated $236 billion a year in economic benefits throughout the North East. The speed of the proposed line is said to top out at 220 miles per hour, a huge improvement from current Acela speeds of 155 mph. These top speeds will top similar lines over seas such as France (TGV), Japan (Shinkansen), Spain (AVE), and the Germany (ICE). The improvement in service times could turn Philadelphia into a "super-bedroom community" for New York by essentially making a commute to the Big Apple take about the same time as a trip to Paoli, said John Connors, managing partner at Brickstone Realty in Philadelphia.
The line would enable Philadelphia businesses to attract employees living in Connecticut and entice New York- based companies to relocate back-office and operational divisions to Philadelphia. Under the proposal, the section connecting New York to Philadelphia, which is expected to cost $20 billion, would be constructed first over a time span of 12 years beginning in 2015. The eight car, 400 passenger train would first stop at 30th Street Station, then at the New Market East Station scheduled for a later phase of the project. The next phase would extend service to Washington D.C. and later extend north to Boston. The Boston to Washington corridor is set to be completed by the year 2040.
When all is said and done, travel times between Boston and Washington will be as low as 4 hours, Washington to New York 1:55, and New York to Boston 1:46.
Download the PDF for full details
Labels: Polity, Real Estate/Development
Frank Gehry Sculpts Philadelphia
Certainly not a typical project for Architect Frank Gehry, or what we would expect when we hear the name Frank Ghery, but indeed the Philadelphia Museum of Art's underground expansion project will be an exciting addition to the city of Brotherly Love.
Gehry joined more than 100 dignitaries, philanthropists and art aficionados last month at the 82-year-old neoclassical landmark to mark the start of construction of a 68,000 square-foot $81 million loading dock and art handling facility. The relocation of the loading dock provides opportunities to re-open a majestic pedestrian entrance unknown and never seen since the 1970s by todays museum patrons. Work on the loading dock should be completed in 2012. Museum officials said the new space will provide much needed improvements for the care and storage of art works and will make deliveries simpler.
After completion of the loading dock, planning will begin on a vast underground gallery, also designed by Gehry. Tons of dirt and rock will be excavated under the steps of the museum, creating cavernous spaces to showcase oversized contemporary works and Asian art as well as rotating exhibitions. The project will add 80,000 square feet of gallery space to the museum. Gehry acknowledged that the loading dock is utilitarian by necessity, but said the public won't be disappointed when the final phase that includes the gallery is complete. The work marks the second phase of the museum's $500 million, 10-year master plan.
"When it's done, people coming to this museum will have an experience that's as big as Bilbao," Gehry told the Associated Press. "It wont be apparent from the outside, but it will knock their socks off inside."
Labels: Culture
Mixed-Use Educational and Housing Facility in North Philadelphia
Philadelphia design firm WRT is designing a new mixed-use educational and residential facility in North Philadelphia for the organization Brighter Hope, a partnership of the Goldenberg Group and Bright Hope Baptist Church. The project calls for the renovation of the former John Wanamaker Middle School for new Temple student housing and renovation of an existing gym and auditorium into a "green technologies center" and a charter school.
"The lively public realm and mix of users envisioned for this project take full advantage of its fortunate location between Temple University and the neighborhood, and between multiple regional rail lines and the Broad Street subway. Creating a vibrant transit-oriented development at this significant town & gown location," said Antonio Fiol-Silva, a principal at WRT involved in the projects design.
The 4.5 acre site at 11th Street and Cecil B. Moore Avenue will contain housing for 2500 student residents. Phase I of WRT's master plan calls for renovating the existing school for 600 beds in 180 units, as well as a new Green Construction Training Center and an Arts & Education Forum. The project targets LEED Silver, maximizing the structures potential for adaptive re-use, and incorporating recycled content materials, energy efficient HVAC systems, and progressive storm water strategies. Future phases include two new high-rise student residential structures, retail, a large open courtyard, and a structured parking facility.
Labels: Real Estate/Development
Integrative Elementary School In Denmark
Danish architects BIG present an interesting take on sustainable design and building with nature. Located in the Denmark city of Asminderod, the sloping roofs of the Vilhelmsro Elementary School blend with the sloping hillside to create one continuous experience both inside and out. The sloping landscape bands allow sunlight to stream through all classrooms as well as providing several energy saving features such as storm water storage, and natural cooling techniques.
View more at archdaily.com
Posted by G8 Living at 9:12 PM 0 comments
Times Square In Philadelphia?
The Gallery and Market East are in need of a desperate facelift. Developers and City Council seam to believe that large animated digital advertisements is exactly what the district needs. A city council bill has been proposed that would create a commercial advertising district on Market, between 7th and 13th Streets. The lighting, supporters say will draw tourists and convention goers to a new entertainment zone near the Gallery shopping mall. Developers want invigorate Market East, envisioning it full of themed restaurants, sidewalk cafes, and movie theaters. There is also talk of bringing in upscale "big-box retail stores" to draw Center City residents who now drive to South Philadelphia for their general household shopping, says Carl Primavera, and attorney who represents billboard companies. In its current state Market East is underwhelming and underdeveloped, lacking the vitality that will entice conventioneers and tourists.
On the contrary opponents see this bill as a disaster. They believe a potentially majestic and charming district will be totally stigmatized with chunky bill-boards and bright lights. Philadelphia is not a second rate city and shouldn't result to desperate measures of imposing a false identity already branded by its big brother just 100 miles up north. Philadelphia's brand has always been history, preservation and the arts. That is why people visit this city. As planners, preservationists, and developers who have an invested interest in the future of Philadelphia, we should be looking at innovative and exciting unique ways to enhance our city while still preserving and staying true to its identity, not settling for easy-fix, temporary, dated and potentially disastrous solutions just to make a quick buck. When Philadelphia gets these rare opportunities to rebrand itself and make a statement to the world that we are a first class city with a lot of great personality, we settle for mediocre. We need to recognize the treasures we already have and enhance and celebrate them, not cover them up or taint them with false illusions.
When people visit Philadelphia they are looking for what makes Philadelphia different from any other city. They ask themselves what is so special about Philadelphia that they can say to their family and friends at home, "You must go to Philadelphia to experience this!" If we continue to borrow experiences instead of creating our own, we will continue to loose our credibility as a first class destination. Lets run with the momentum of Green in 2015 and set our sights on becoming a global destination by 2035 with creative bold ideas that bridge commerce, history, entertainment, leisure, accessibility, education and livability.
Also check out "Bright Lights Big Mistake?"at Philly.com
Schwarzenegger Rallies For United Governments On Climate
Since the failed attempt at a global climate-change treaty, California has been exploring other alternatives to reduce greenhouse gases. Governor Arnold Swarzenegger is pushing state and regional governments around the world to act, stating the effort must be led locally in the absence of national and international momentum. At his third and final California climate summit at the University of California, Davis, the governor enthusiastically encouraged unity in ushering in a new era of building a cleaner and brighter, more prosperous future to over 1,500 attendees from more than 80 countries.
Schwarzenegger is hoping states and provinces from more than 20 countries will launch a program being considered by the united Nations to secure financing for carbon-cutting projects in industrialized and developing nations. Talks leading up to a U.N. climate summit in Mexico already have divided rich and developing nations over the issue of intellectual property rights, compromising the possibility of making any binding cuts in greenhouse gases. In the U.S., instead of pursuing legislation that would cap emissions through a carbon market, the Obama Administration intends to bypass Congress and regulate greenhouse gases directly through federal agencies.
Schwarzenegger said the failure at the federal and international levels should not discourage local governments from adopting their own policies on climate change. The governor pointed out that the "green revolution" is happening at the local level in places like Africa, Australia, China, Norway, and the U.S. There is great promise for this level of commitment with California and other States and leaders of Provinces in Morocco and France moving forward with their own nonprofit financing programs. This could create the motivation and reality that climate solutions are real.
Read more at GreenSource Magazine
Revamping South Delaware Waterfront
Despite future plans for a Foxwoods Casino at its proposed site at Columbus Boulevard and Reed Street, planners for the Delaware River waterfront imagine far greater potential for this section of the river. With the bad press and out of control crime at the recently opened Sugarhouse Casino farther north up river, there is no wonder planners are looking past the casino option and envisioning a more communal, economic, and culturally balanced approach. With a casino out of the way, the neighborhood would be more residential friendly welcoming future hotel options and retail. The neighborhood would have great potential for being a destination place to live, work, and rest while visiting the city and sports arenas. Future light rail transportation connection from Port Richmond and Market Street to Oregon Ave, the Sports complex, and the Navy Yard will make the waterfront and its neighborhoods a viable and convenient place to live.
Planners imagine a restored wetland park based on the deteriorated piers from 53 to 70 with nesting platforms for osprey and eagles. The area currently hosting Walmart and Home Depot will continue to host the big box stores, but will shrink to a more urban-friendly vertical form, with stores fronting Columbus Boulevard and underground parking or a well designed parking garage. The freed land can allow streets to extend across the boulevard and host new residential developments creating a balance of residences, retail, and industry. Neighboring retailers can follow suite with Target, Lowes, IKEA, and Best Buy also going vertical, stacking their facilities freeing up land for new development. These solutions expand the lifespan of these large retailers creating healthy communities and a consistent supply of customers.
Downtown Dadeland near Miami
Posted by G8 LIFE at 2:26 PM 0 comments
Fishtown; One Of America's Most Fuel Efficient Neighborhoods
Philadelphia's Fishtown neighborhood, located along the Delaware River has been listed as one of America's most fuel efficient neighborhoods according to a Forbes.com study. With centrally located residences from hip lofts in converted warehouses hosting the next generation of artist, graphic designers, and entrepreneurs, to freshly renovated town homes and New Construction. There's no wonder why the neighborhood is a magnet for young fast paste yuppie and hipsters commuting to Center City and Temple University. Transportation cost are the second-lowest among neighborhoods in the 10 largest metropolitan neighborhoods. Public transit ridership is at around 12%, with short commutes to Old City,Center City and close by Northern Liberties.
G8 Goes ECO at York St.
G8 is nearing completion of its renovation project at 2045 York Street. Among at list of energy saving sustainable features to the 3 story town home, G8 has decided to go with ECO for its countertops. ECO, developed by Cosentino is a durable surface made of 75% recycled content composed of post-industrial or post-consumer materials and is bound by an environmentally friendly resin which comes in part from corn oil. ECO is an ideal substitute for natural or engineered stone. The product received the Readers Choice Award for Best Surfacing Material by Interiors Sources in 2009. The counter top is made of recycled glass, mirrors and ceramic. It never needs to be sealed, unlike concrete counter tops, is maintenance free and stronger than granite. ECO is cut to order, therefor leaving no waste. Check out the variety of color options shown below.
Labels: G8 LIVING, Technology
High-Speed Rail, Americas Next Frontier in Transpo...
Mixed-Use Educational and Housing Facility in Nort...
Schwarzenegger Rallies For United Governments On C...
Fishtown; One Of America's Most Fuel Efficient Nei...
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Tired of the bullshit?
Thu Oct 25, 11:32 AM
We are supporters of Justice Democrats, a nonprofit organization devoted to helping progressive candidates run for office as democrats to help transform the party from within. Their platform includes universal health care, free tuition at public universities and trade schools, protecting women’s rights, ending racism, and getting corporate money out of politics. We suggest you read more about them here
We’ve put together a couple of great fundraising shows for this coming weekend, to help raise awareness about Justice Democrats, and to support two local Congressional candidates: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY 14) and Jess King (PA 11). The bills are great, and admission is just ten bucks. Here are the details:
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 26 – music starts at 9PM:
Savak
Spectre Folk (Peter Meehan, Pete Nolan of Magik Markers, Steve Shelley of Sonic Youth and Mark Ibold of Pavement
Sunwatchers (with Jonathan Kane sitting in on drums)
SUNDAY, OCTOBER 28 – music starts at 8PM:
Sharkmuffin
Joy Cleaner
The venue is FM, which is at 240 3rd Street in Jersey City. Representatives from Justice Democrats will be on hand to sign up volunteers for last-minute canvassing and phonebanking for the 26 candidates they’ve endorsed who are running for Congress. You can make a difference. You can move the needle. And you can have fun at two great shows. Come on down.
Copyright ©2013, 2018 Dromedary Records. All rights reserved | About Dromedary | Privacy Policy
Site design and development by Allegra Media
The 65's
Personality Crisis
Out now: “Personality Crisis,” a raunchy cover of the New York Dolls’ classic by New Jersey punk veterans The 65’s. All proceeds will be donated to the GoFundMe campaign of Dolls’ guitarist Sylvain Sylvain, currently undergoing cancer treatment.
To make a donation to Sylvain’s GoFundMe yourself (and we humbly ask that you do), visit here
Teenage Waistline
We are sold out of limited-edition lathe-cut 7“s of Teenage Waistline, the new single by Richmond, VA’s Positive No, but you can still pick it up on all digital formats.
We can’t say enough about what awesome people the band are, and their aggressive style of melodic pop is right up our alley.
Easter Tuesday is the latest release from New Jersey power pop band Joy Cleaner. Out now on cassette, digital and limited-edition lathe-cut 7” picture disc.
We’re really excited to be working with this band, one of our favorite bands in New Jersey. Check it out!
Like us on Facebook Follow us on Twitter Watch us on YouTube Listen on SoundCloud Email us
Guy Capecelatro III • "Splinters" (from the "Switch" b/w "Splinters" digital single)
The Mommyheads • "Medicine Show" (from the album VULNERABLE BOY)
Cuppa Joe • "Bottlerocket" (from the "Nurture" CD)
Penguins Kill Polar Bears • "Lungs" (from the "Vessels & Veins" EP)
Guy Capecelatro III • "Like Anything" (from the "North for the Winter" CD)
d.smith • "Fuck and Run" (from the "From '93 'Til Infinity" CD Compilation)
The Mommyheads • "Hello Friends" (from the "Delicate Friction" CD)
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Wankers
Got confronted with this warning on a youtube clip this month whilst trawling through old kiwi faves.... "This video contains content from WMG. It is no longer available in your country"
Warners Music Group don't own the rights to that clip nor many others of NZ origin they routinely block
WMG youse is wankers
Hope you had a rocking Zombie Awareness Month
500 songs later
Just finished my second voyage throught eh pitchfork 500
Super enjoyable ride through a period of modern music that I am very familar with, I skipped U2's New Year’s Day as I don't think anyone should have to endure U2, not least me.
So here it is my last couple of weeks listening...
Pitchfork 500: Our Guide to the Greatest Songs from Punk to the Present
In The Pitchfork 500: Our Guide to the Greatest Songs from Punk to the Present, Pitchfork offers up their take on the 500 best songs of the past three decades. Focusing on indie rock (Arcade Fire, the Shins), hip-hop (Public Enemy, Jay-Z), electronic (Daft Punk, Boards of Canada), pop (Madonna, Justin Timberlake), metal (Metallica, Boris), and experimental underground music (Suicide, Boredoms), The Pitchfork 500 features all-new essays and reviews written with the sharp wit and insight for which the site is known.
Kicking it off in 1977 with the birth of punk and independent music, The Pitchfork 500 runs chronologically, with each…
Hat tip to smiley
Man.... I love this song... welcome to my blog old friend
A world of contrasts
baaa
Fresh to you each day
Hat tip to Wayde
A Certain Ratio-Flight
Two little boys
Here comes the taxman
and now with added boompty bounce
If these are the end of days when were the...
I hear the air
When I get married this dude is so booked
Beard Of Bees
Don't Be Memory
the volkswagon cafe scene
Have a look around
They came in the dark
Once upon a time Bob went to univeristy and listened to music like this when he should have been drinking... oh alright sometimes I would drink and then listen to music like this
music like this makes me smile
Keep the bastards guessing
What to play?
I'm playing some records tonight
'Smash the Jukebox' is a celebration of all things New Zealand Music, Past and Present. A chance for everyone to come together and celebrate the History behind the Music and Give back to a Valuable Charity at the same time.
The event will host DJs and Live Music all of whom will be playing solely NZ Tunes, past and present, originals and covers. The line-up pulls together some of New Zealand's most influential industry characters and lets them run wild, playing the music that influenced them. From Music Heads to Industry changes, Musicians and Radio / TV personalities. Smash the Jukebox has them all in one place celebrating music and supporting a great cause.
Live Performances by:
- Bannerman
- Flip Grater
- Josephine Costain
DJ Sets from:
- Andrew Buckton - Studio 203 / Best Engineer 09
- Troy Ferguson - 95bfm "The Rock n Roll Wire"
- Peter McLennan - Dub Asylum, Base FM, Kiwi FM
- Andrew Manning - 95bfm "Freak the sheep"
- Murray Cammick - Founder of Rip it Up…
On an unknown beach
I so adore this song...
Sure fire day brightner
I don't know what happened in the gulf but...
It is dark and I am frightened
I Just Want To Be
Go With The Bull
I'm just so different, you know
No Means No
Zombie Awareness Month
Many films important to the evolution of the modern zombie are set in the month of May, from the original Night of the Living Dead, 1968, to the well received Dawn of The Dead remake of 2004.
Also, because Spring (our Autumn so this doesn't wash for New Zealand zombie culture) naturally brings with it a sense of renewal and hopefulness, May is the perfect month to emphasize continued vigilance in the face of the coming zombie pandemic.
Supporters of Zombie Awareness Month wear a gray ribbon to signify the undead shadows that lurk behind our modern light of day. From May 1 through May 31, concerned citizens take this small step to acknowledge the coming danger.
http://www.zombieresearch.org/zombieawarenessmonth.html
Man.... I love this song... welcome to my blog old...
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Home News International Trump says US troops needed in Afghanistan to protect Pak N-arms
Trump says US troops needed in Afghanistan to protect Pak N-arms
Mar 05, 2016International
WASHINGTON: If elected to the White House, Republican frontrunner Donald Trump would keep US troops in Afghanistan to ‘protect’ Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal.
“I think you have to stay in Afghanistan for a while, because of the fact that you are right next to Pakistan, which has nuclear weapons and we have to protect that,” said Mr Trump while responding to a question during Thursday night’s Republican presidential debate.
Mr Trump is an outsider who blitzkrieged into the 2016 Republican presidential campaign and propelled himself into the first position by capturing the highest number of delegates in early primaries. He is particularly popular among conservative Republicans and in rural America, where 70 per cent white voters live.
“Nuclear weapons change the game,” said the billionaire campaigner while explaining why Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal necessitated continued US military presence in Afghanistan.
Last year, Mr Trump suggested involving India in efforts to denuclearise Pakistan. “You have to get India involved. India’s the check to Pakistan,” he said in a radio address in September.
“They (India) have their own nukes and have a very powerful army. They seem to be the real check… I think we have to deal very closely with India to deal with it (Pakistan),” he added.
Mr Trump’s suggestion to keep US troops in Afghanistan was one of the few serious references to foreign policy issues at the presidential debate.
Most US media outlets described the debate in Detroit, Michigan, as a two-hour long shouting match with no substance.
The prestigious New Yorker magazine ran its report on the debate with the headline: “Donald Trump and an even cruder Republican debate.”
“One clear loser in Thursday’s debate: the Grand Old (Republican) Party,” The Washington Post reported.
The post noted that following his big wins in Super Tuesday primaries, “this might have been the night when Trump could safely shift into statesman mode”. But he lost the opportunity.
Last week, former CIA director Michael Hayden said in an interview to a US media outlet that the American military would refuse to obey Mr Trump if he gets elected and orders them to torture prisoners or kill the families of terrorists.
At the debate, a moderator, Bret Baier, asked Mr Trump to comment on Gen Hayden’s statement. Mr Trump rejected the suggestion that the US military would defy their president.
“But they’re illegal,” Mr Baier reminded him. “Let me just tell you, look at the Middle East. They’re chopping off heads,” Mr Trump said.
“I said it’s fine! And if we want to go stronger, I’d go stronger, too,” said Mr Trump, while defending his earlier statement that he would allow waterboarding to coerce information from suspected terrorists. The remarks earned him a wild applause from the audience.
“What would these animals over in the Middle East, that chopped off heads think of a hesitation to commit war crimes?” Mr Trump asked.
“We should go for waterboarding and we should go tougher than waterboarding.” Monitoring Desk
Previous PostPhilippines impounds North Korean ship under UN sanctions Next PostPakistan, China set for near-record wheat harvest in 2016
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digital humanities asia @ stanford university
DHAsia 2018 Schedule Released
Digital Humanities Asia: Harnessing Digital Technologies to Advance the Study of Asia and the Non-Western World
Stanford Humanities Center
With support from the Mellon Foundation, the American Council of Learned Societies, the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange, and multiple departments, centers, and divisions at Stanford University, the DHAsia 2018 Summit will focus on four (4) areas of research that represent both the core of DH as a whole, as well as areas in which Asian Studies scholars have been underserved and under-resourced: (1) the Spatial Analysis of Asian Human Geographies, (2) Text Mining and Computational Analysis of Asian & Non-Latin Scripts, (3) Network Analysis of Non-Western social formations, and (4) the development of Digital Humanities tools and platforms designed for the unique challenges of Asian Studies scholarship.
REGISTRATION LINK: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/digital-humanities-asia-2018-summit-tickets-37824237312
SCHEDULE (subject to change)
DAY ONE | Friday, April 27, 2018
9:00-9:30 | WELCOME
Thomas S. Mullaney (Stanford University)
Opening Remarks and Logistics
Michelle Damian, Monmouth College, “Recreating Medieval Japanese Shipping Routes: Merging Geospatial Analysis with Ancient Documents”
Sarah Frederick, Boston University, “Mapping Modern Japanese Literature: GIS Mapping of Natsume Soseki’s Kyoto Journeys”
Ruth Mostern, University of Pittsburgh, “Toward a World Historical Gazetteer”
Marcus Bingenheimer, Temple University, “Who was Important in Chinese Buddhist History? A Social Network Analysis Approach”
11:00-11:15 | Coffee Break
Debashree Mukherjee, Columbia University, “Maps, Microhistories and Macroanalysis: Digital Futures of Indian Film History”
Elias Muhanna, Brown University, “Exploring Vernacular Expression in the Digital Realm”
Xenia Zeiler, University of Helsinki, “Asian Video Games and Gaming: Methods for Researching Games and Gaming Videos (Let’s Plays)”
LUNCH PROVIDED FOR SPEAKERS & CHAIRS ONLY
Chen Jing, Nanjing University & Tani Barlow, Rice University, “Advertising Chinese Modern Society: Graphesis, Concept Modeling, Historical Method”
Cécile Armand, Stanford University, “MADSpace, A Digital Platform Devoted to the Spatial History of Advertising in Modern Shanghai (1905-1949)”
Christian Henriot, Aix-Marseille University, “Exploring the Space-Time of Entertainment in Shanghai: From Newspaper Advertisements to Large-Scale Database”
Hyun-Joo Kim, Yonsei University & Jae-Yon Lee, Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology, “Between ‘Society’ and ‘Literature’: The Problematic Position of ‘Culture’ in a 1920 Intellectual Magazine in Korea”
3:00-3:15 | Coffee Break
Lisa Nguyen, Stanford University & Kaoru Ueda, Stanford University, “Hoji Shinbun Digital Collection: Data Mining, Image Analysis, and Knowledge Discovery Project”
Liu Chao-Lin, National Chengchi University, “Textual Analysis and Linked Open Data for Digital Humanities”
Tom Cramer, Stanford University, “IIIF: An Emerging, Global Platform for DH”
Gil Ben-Herut, University of South Florida, “Connected Bhakti Bibliographies Database”
Javier Cha, Seoul National University, “Discovering Unnamed Entities in East Asian Sources using Computational Methods”
Táňa Dhluhošová, Oriental Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences & Chang Lung-chih, Institute of Taiwan History, Academia Sinica, “DH Methods and Defining the Political Capital of Ruling Elites in Taiwan (1935–1950)”
Lik Hang Tsui, Harvard University, “How Many People have Your Name? Computational Approaches to Name Disambiguation for Chinese Historical Figures”
Adam Liu, Stanford University, “A Spatial Approach to the Political Economy of Banking in China”
DAY TWO | Saturday, April 28, 2018
Tina Lu, Yale University, “Digital Infrastructure as Digitally Informed Research: The Ten Thousand Rooms Project”
Charles Chang, Purdue University, “Christian Symbols in Chinese Holidays: A Computational Analysis of Religious Practice in Rural China”
Kevin McDowell, University of Oregon, “Contested Creations: Crowdsourcing the Cataloging of Japanese Votive Slips”
Ryo Morimoto, Harvard University, “The Challenges and Possibilities of a Participatory Digital Humanities Platform: A Case Study of the Japan Disasters Digital Archive”
Michael Stanley-Baker, Nanyang Technological University, “The Opposite of Topic-Modelling? Using Docusky to Situate the Distribution of Medical Knowledge in Buddhist and Daoist Canons”
Hilde De Weerdt, Leiden University, “The History of Chinese City Walls (1000-1900): Digital Approaches to the History of Construction in Imperial China”
Ian Morley, Chinese University of Hong Kong, “Re-Evaluating Urban Space and Globalization in Manila: The Plaza de Mexico Digital History Project”
Sangyop Lee, Stanford University, “Masters (shi) versus Ascetics (kujie): The Spectrum of Religiosity in Early Chinese Buddhist Monasticism”
Paul Vierthaler, Leiden University, “Sequence Alignment and Intertextuality Detection in Large Chinese Corpora”
Donald Sturgeon, Harvard University, “Citation Practice in Pre-modern Chinese Literature”
Jeffrey Tharsen, University of Chicago, “New Methods for Large-Scale Comparative Analyses and Visualizations of Semantic, Syntactic, and Phonetic Parallels in Asian Texts”
Anatoly Detwyler, Columbia University, “Text Mining Maospeak: A Scaled Analysis of Literary Politics in the Early People’s Republic of China, 1949-1976”
Hoyt Long, University of Chicago, “The Semantics of Race under Empire”
Matthew Thomas Miller, University of Maryland, “Distant Reading Persian Poetry: A Topic Modeling-Driven Approach to Studying Generic Categories in Medieval Persian Poetry”
A. Sean Pue, Michigan State University, “The Politics of Sound in Modern Hindi/Urdu Poetry”
Amanda Shuman, University of Freiburg, “Doing Digital History of the People’s Republic of China: The Maoist Legacy Project Database and Its Discontents”
Tu Hsieh-Chang, National Taiwan University, “DocuSky as a Platform for Processing Personal Data Sets”
Tom Derrick, British Library, “Towards a Digital Awakening of Bangla: The Challenges and Opportunities for Digitising Early Indian Print”
Chen Shih-Pei, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, “Chinese Local Gazetteers As a Database”
6:00-6:30 | Closing Discussion
Thomas S. Mullaney, Associate Professor of Chinese History, Stanford University
tsmullaney@stanford.edu
Conference is free and open to the public, but registration is HIGHLY appreciated. Coffee breaks will be provided for attendees, but NO meals will be provided to anyone other than conference speakers.
https://transportation.stanford.edu/parking/purchase-a-parking-permit/visitors
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1 page (4)
1 photograph: black and white (2)
big pine reparations association (1)
black, j. d. (john david), 1893-1960 (1)
black, j. d. (john david), 1893-1960; higgins, ralph (1)
big pines reparations association reparations membership black, j. d. (john david), 1893-1960; higgins, ralph a.; water rights -- california -- owens valley water rights -- california -- los angeles (1)
college chaplains -- california -- los angeles jesuits college students (1)
higgins, thomas loyola marymount university (1)
keenan, john higgins, thomas bonura, mario loyola university of los angeles (1)
land use legislation -- california contracts united states. bureau of reclamation los angeles (calif.) board of public service commissioners water rights -- california -- owens valley water rights -- california -- los angeles real property -- purchasing -- (1)
membership reparations claims big pine reparations association water rights -- california -- owens valley water rights -- california -- los angeles (1)
metabolic studio los angeles aqueduct la aqueduct acqua (1)
metabolic studio los angeles aqueduct la aqueduct acquaduct (1)
newspapers -- california -- los angeles barmore, a. g. (albert); joseph, louis rossi, rafael sanger, w. a.; black, j. d. (john david), 1893-1960; mcdonald, a. r.; higgins, ralph a.; mendenhall, w. w.; williams, h. r.; water rights -- california -- owens va (1)
universities and colleges -- alumni and alumnae reunions barbecues (1)
All fields: Higgins
Letters between J. D Black and Ralph Higgins
Big Pines Reparations Association; Reparations; Membership; Black, J. D. (John David), 1893-1960; Higgins, Ralph A.; Water rights--California--Owens Valley; Water rights--California--Los Angeles
After a reparations bill of California was passed in April 1925, the Big Pine Property Owners Association (BPPOA) formed the Big Pine Reparations Association (BPRA) on July 29, 1925 to establish reparations claims against the City of Los Angeles...
Big Pine Reparations Association membership and assignment contract agreement with R. A. Higgins
Membership; Reparations; Claims; Big Pine Reparations Association; Water rights--California--Owens Valley; Water rights--California--Los Angeles
Thomas Higgins, S.J., at Spiritual Advice Booth
College chaplains--California--Los Angeles; Jesuits; College students
Protest against the City of Los Angeles
Newspapers--California--Los Angeles; Barmore, A. G. (Albert); Joseph, Louis; Rossi, Rafael; Sanger, W. A.; Black, J. D. (John David), 1893-1960; McDonald, A. R.; Higgins, Ralph A.; Mendenhall, W. W.; Williams, H. R.; Water rights--California--Owens...
To meet the need for water of its growing population, the City of Los Angeles began acquiring water rights in the Owens Valley in 1905. The Los Angeles Aqueduct was completed in 1913 to bring Owens Valley water to the city. During the 1920s, the...
John Keenan, Thomas Higgins, S.J., and Mario Bonura at Loyola Alumni Barbeque, circa 1965
Universities and colleges--Alumni and alumnae; Reunions; Barbecues
Protest to Board of Public Service Commissioners of City of Los Angeles, August 1924
Land use; Legislation--California; Contracts; United States. Bureau of Reclamation; Los Angeles (Calif.) Board of Public Service Commissioners; Water rights--California--Owens Valley; Water rights--California--Los Angeles; Real...
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School of Philosophy
Faculty of History and Archaeology
Ελληνική αρχική σελίδα
English homepage » Postgraduate Studies » Departmental Programmes
Departmental Programmes
Master Theses (1990-2018)
Interdepartmental Programmes
Engish taught programme
Diploma Supplement (ΕCTS)
Collections/Labs
Research & Congresses
The Postgraduate Program “History and Archaeology”
The Postgraduate Programmes of the Department of History and Archaeology are designed:
to offer a series of specialised courses , providing in-depth knowledge on fields and methods taught in the Department, leading to a Master's degree.
to supervise and support candidates to conduct original research in the same fields leading to a doctoral dissertation.
The postgraduate programmes are either two-year (full time) or three-year (part-time) cycles of study with specialised research-oriented seminars and a Master's dissertation.
Admission to the postgraduate program is through entrance exams according to the program's by-laws, which are issued annually.
For more details, please refer to the websites of the individual programmes:
Archaeology and History of the Ancient World: from the Early Prehistory to Late Antiquity
The world of Byzantium: History and Archaeology
Modern and Contemporary History and History of Art
Copyright © 2008-2011 National and Kapodestrian University of Athens
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Ruth Strand Poster Contest
2019 Ruth Strand Poster Contest Winners Announced
Children have a unique view of local history, and their colorful perspectives on the subject were well-documented in the entries received for the 2019 Ruth Strand Poster Contest.
The annual Ruth Strand Poster Contest, which is sponsored by the Elmhurst Heritage Foundation and the Elmhurst History Museum, challenged second grade students to depict and describe a scene from Elmhurst history. The contest honors Ruth Strand, the long-time director of the Elmhurst Public Library and a founding member of what is now the Elmhurst History Museum. The Elmhurst Heritage Foundation presents the contest each year as part of its mission to stimulate broad-based support for local history, the Elmhurst History Museum, and the Churchville Schoolhouse through advocacy, education, and fundraising.
More than 300 students from nine Elmhurst schools participated in the contest, and members of the community voted to select the winners. The first place poster, created by Mia Ofiara of Field Elementary School, was an attractive rendering of the York Theatre complete with dimensional letters and gold decorative touches to echo the art deco style of the theatre’s original marquee. The second place winner Anya Denninger from Lincoln School selected the Elmhurst Quarry as her topic, and third place winner Natalie Wierzbicki of Jackson School drew a picture of the Bicentennial Fountain in downtown Elmhurst. The winning contest posters will be displayed at Elmhurst City Hall on the 2nd floor.
The following students received honorable mention recognition for their Ruth Strand poster contest entries: Parker Byford, Jackson; Emma Famarin, Field; Aimee Glorioso, Emerson; Brenner Harges, Hawthorne; Anna Herron, Edison; Lanie Shish, Lincoln; Sam Sianis, Jefferson; Brithney Solis, Fischer.
The poster contest winners were honored on May 22 at a reception at Elmhurst City Hall, and they will be recognized at the June 3rd Elmhurst City Council meeting. Students received gift bags from the Elmhurst Heritage Foundation, and schools with ten or more participants received a $100 grant to support their school’s library. The winners also will march with the Elmhurst Heritage Foundation in the Elmhurst Memorial Day Parade on May 27.
The Elmhurst Heritage Foundation congratulates and thanks all of the 2019 Ruth Strand Poster Contest participants and their teachers and families for sharing their beautiful depictions of Elmhurst history with the community.
Churchville Schoolhouse
Museum Programs & Field Trips
Portable Museum Programs
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Comedy Bang Bang
Earwolf Productions
Episode 217 — The WTF Hour
By admin, May 2, 2013 in Comedy Bang Bang
johnnyhaggis 63
Oh cool, an episode of a podcast where Marc talks about himself for an hour!
(Not sarcasm)
... most of these bonus eps are plugging something specific anyway so I expected it.
Hmm, interesting - so do you think it was a serious episode because Marc Maron's IFC promoter people thought that'd be a better way to get the message out? Last time Maron was on they had a really fun shenanigan filled episode, and he seemed to be having a good time, so I don't think it's him that requested it be a serious episode. Or do you think a 2nd guest flaked out and this was Aukerman's way of making the best out of the situation?
Shannon 2952
-------- Moderator -------- Mother of Wolves
OH NOO!!! Can I not use this gif anymore? I feel bad promoting a time when Scott feels he looks bad
I think you look great Scott.
thestray 360
I didn't even think of it as a "serious" episode. It was one on one, but it seemed just as fun and loose as most episodes.
benk 257
Loved the episode! Very enjoyable change of pace.
knobtwiddler 6
Such a great episode. It's popped in my mind way too many times that Marc needs to come back to Bang Bang. Selfishly I've been hoping for Marc in the traditional CBB format of interview interrupted by crazy character and then a game but this was really nice. I was afraid it would be nothing but serious but Scott kept his general, well, Scottyness about him. These two need to get together more. Marc is ridiculously entertaining at Would You Rather? Thank you for saying Maron in your Italian way in front of the man.
SendsMusic 3
Wolfpup
Location: Orlando
Positive comment about the episode.
Roger Taylor made love with a steering wheel once, so I heard.
choochoo_the_wonder_slut 739
\\\ ^[o.o]^ ///
Tombrien 50
Fuck you corporate kitchens, I hate you so much more than anything!!
Uterine Helmet 81
Fucking marvellous episode. Two great men that taste great together.
Or something less gay.
Grover 9
Location: The underground lake, Benson, NE
I don't know if the CBB theme song is necessarily "precious", but it most certainly is based on the the novel "Push" by Sapphire.
Poika 615
Well, he was in love with his car. He had a feel for his automobile.
drtana 25
This is more of a b-b-b-b-bonus episode of WTF than it is a b-b-b-b-bonus episode of CBB.
Agreed! But it wasn't bad or anything. It was just weird that Maron stays pretty serious the whole time which is kind of not what I listen to CBB for (I guess it's because there was no second guest). Scott keeps trying to derail him into more surreal and irreverent CBB-like territory with homophones and the like and it just doesn't work, which, in itself is pretty funny.
GarbageCan 143
Engineering Physicist, Tinkler of Ivories
Patton Oswalt has got to be fuming with jealousy that Scott was really able to get into Maron's pain without being interrupted by an abuser of the open door policy.
DrBeat84 1
Wow. What a terrible episode of Comedy Bang Bang. Absolutely jam-packed with the worst kind of navel-gazing. Scott tried his best to make it interesting but was shot down at every turn by the relentlessly self-obsessed Marc Maron. If that's what the WTF podcast is like, I'm glad I've never listened to it.
AstronautDown 282
5th U2 member.
I was disappointed that there was no open door policy on this one. Might have been IFC's promo department's demand but I would not be surprized if Marón himself asked from Scott to... lock the gates.
Damn, I recently went back and listened to some Patton Oswalt ones and I agree 100%. I think it's time we had that one on one after all...
Yeah, that's basically why I stopped listening to WTF.
gonzagylot00 28
Location: Carrboro, NC
Not the funniest episode ever, but there were portions that I enjoyed:
-Hearing some comradarie between these two figures that may seem like they would dislike each other, or not associate with one another
-Maron's little swipes at Scott, which the chocktaw called him out for
-The Reimagining of the Matrix
-I don't think it was contrived when Marc got wistful..... Scott succeeded!
ocean_machine 56
Location: The Earth
I want to like Marc, I really do.
Good episode, although I feel like "Would You Rather?" really needs more than one person to make it fun. Marc was a good sport about it, though.
Hot - Slunch 771
Hmm, interesting - so do you think it was a serious episode because Marc Maron's IFC promoter people thought that'd be a better way to get the message out?
I bet it's that. Well, something like IFC put the idea out and Scott thought it would be a cool idea to out-Maron Maron. That turns the episode premise into a bit, lets Scott host differently, and gets the plug job done. I don't think it was maliciously done or anything, but a way to cross promote and hopefully bump up viewership a bit.
Think about it though, the bonus eps that I remember off the top of my head were Kashian plugging her book and Garland plugging his new podcast on the network. Those plugs seemed to permeate the episode a lot more than just a plug section at the end.
Johnny Unusual 522
Location: Fredericton, New Brunswick
I actually rather enjoyed the episode and I'm not really a big fan of Maron. He's someone I acknowledge as very funny and talented, but I'm usually not a fan of abrasive personalities in general (which is probably I despite his talent, I don't think I'll ever be a Bill Burr fan). I think despite that it's a really entertaining episode and though I wouldn't want it to be a common thing, I thought the one on one was a good change of pace. That said, I was praying that Scott and Maron would do Jukebox Jury. That's a segment that gets better with an abrasive personality... Though in my opinion, I think for a perfect round, you need someone who won't put up with the song, a devil's advocate or someone who will give constructive criticism and Scott (who is sort of in-between).
Loved every part of the episode...EXCEPT
Half way through when Marion was talking about his first TV deal which centered around him being a chef you can hear Engineer Frank get a Google Talk message by the notable Google Talk 'ding' that came over the audio.
This is unbelievably inappropriate, unprofessional, and unacceptable. Engineer Frank; if you are out there reading this you need to take a long hard look in the mirror. Shame on you. Brett Morris or Cody would NEVER let such an atrocity occur.
Listen. I will find it within my heart to forgive you, but you also have to be able to forgive yourself. You can't beat yourself up over this too much. Be the 'Engineer Frank' that deep down inside you know you can be
Joe Lerini 7329
"Solo Bolo" inspired me to listen to this "Accidental Bolo." I found this enjoyable for entirely different reasons. I also watched a portion of MARONE! while waiting for the new CBB episode on IFC, and I thought it was funny. I imagine I'll give a full episode a viewing one of these days.
MikeCalhoun 10
Interesting to hear? Yes.
Could have done without? Yes.
Has it changed my opinion on Maron? Sadly No.
I just can't get into his kind of interview or nostalgia. It's like all my friends that only talk about the past and never do anything.
Go To Topic Listing Comedy Bang Bang
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Post time Jan 28, 2019 20:43 | Show all posts |Read mode
First http://www.chargersauthorizedshops.com/authentic-kyzir-white-jersey , it was third-string catcher Kyle Higashioka getting the silent treatment in the dugout after a home run. Then, the same for Aaron Hicks when he hit homer No. 3.On a 91-degree night with the pennant race heating up, the New York Yankees enjoyed some more yucks against their biggest rival.
Hicks launched three home runs and the Yankees pummeled David Price again, connecting five times in the first four innings Sunday on the way to an 11-1 rout of the Boston Red Sox.
”It feels awesome,” Hicks said. ”I blacked out after the third one. Kind of didn’t know what to do. But I mean, it’s exciting.”
Luis Severino became the first 13-game winner in the majors, cruising through 6 2/3 shutout innings of two-hit ball after the Bronx Bombers quickly built him a big cushion. With the teams trading blowouts all weekend, the Yankees (54-27) took two of three from Boston to regain baseball’s best record and first place in the AL East.
”It’s going to be a dogfight. We have a good team, they have a good team,” Red Sox manager Alex Cora said. ”A weird series, honestly. It was very weird. Weird games.”
Aaron Judge and Gleyber Torres also homered for New York, which leads the 19-game season series 5-4. The next time the teams meet is early August at Fenway Park.
”I’m sure it’s going to be a fun few months,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said.
The first Yankees leadoff batter to hit three home runs in a game, Hicks connected twice from the right side of the plate and once from the left. He smacked a two-run shot to right field in the second inning and a solo drive to center in the fourth that chased Price (9-6) and made it 8-0.
Hicks pulled his 14th of the season into the right-field stands in the eighth off Hector Velazquez. It was the first three-homer game by a Yankees player since Alex Rodriguez, part of the ESPN broadcast crew Sunday, accomplished the feat at Minnesota in July 2015.
The only other Yankees hitter to go deep three times at the current Yankee Stadium was Curtis Granderson in April 2012 against the Twins.
Judge had three hits and scored three times. Torres socked a three-run shot that gave New York a 4-0 lead in the first, and the Yankees finished with a season-high six homers to boost their major league-leading total to 137 http://www.dolphinsauthorizedshops.com/authentic-kalen-ballage-jersey , setting a franchise record for before the All-Star break.
Exactly halfway through its season, New York is on pace to surpass the 1997 Seattle Mariners’ mark of 264 homers.
”That’s probably as good a night as we’ve had all year,” Boone said. ”Obviously, a big series to grab it on Sunday here. That’s a peak at what we can do.”
Higashioka homered into the second deck in left field off Price for his first major league hit after an 0-for-22 start to his career. Higashioka, wearing No. 66 in pinstripes, received the silent treatment when he returned to the bench before happy teammates finally engulfed him.
”The feeling is indescribable,” Higashioka said at his locker, the team’s championship belt for the night draped over his chair. ”I laughed. I didn’t expect that, but I mean, obviously it was amazing. It was just a great feeling.”
Price was rocked for eight earned runs – matching a career high – and nine hits in 3 1/3 innings, his latest flop against the Yankees. He had never given up more than three homers in a game.
Severino (13-2) lowered his AL-leading ERA to 1.98 and improved to 8-0 at home this season. He walked off to a standing ovation from the sellout crowd of 46,795 and tipped his cap , right on track to become the first Yankees pitcher to start the All-Star Game since Roger Clemens in 2001.
”It means a lot,” Severino said. ”Facing the Red Sox is one of the best things in baseball.”
Boston (56-29) was outhit 16-4 and didn’t score until the ninth.
THE PRICE IS WRONG
Making his 40th career appearance (39th start) vs. the Yankees, Price fell to 2-6 with an 8.43 ERA in nine starts against them since signing a $217 million contract with Boston before the 2016 season. He has faced New York twice this year, allowing 12 earned runs in 4 1/3 innings, and is 0-5 with a 10.44 ERA in his last five starts at Yankee Stadium.
”Honestly http://www.dolphinsauthorizedshops.com/authentic-durham-smythe-jersey , I felt fine. They put some good swings on what I felt like were pretty good pitches,” said Price, who entered 7-1 with a 2.72 ERA in nine starts since being diagnosed with a mild case of carpal tunnel syndrome that caused him to miss a scheduled turn at New York in May. ”I’ve faced the Yankees many times. It’s time for me to kind of go back to that drawing board.”
Red Sox: Right-handed reliever Tyler Thornburg is expected back this week after rehabbing from surgery for thoracic outlet syndrome last June.
Yankees: Higashioka started at catcher for Austin Romine, who exited Saturday’s game with tightness in his left hamstring. A precautionary MRI was negative, and Romine was available off the bench. He could return to the lineup Monday night against Atlanta. Romine has been filling in for All-Star backstop Gary Sanchez (groin), who might be able to come off the disabled list right after the All-Star break July 20-22 against the Mets. … GM Brian Cashman said if everything goes well, RHP Masahiro Tanaka (two strained hamstrings) will make a minor league rehab start this week and rejoin the Yankees early next week in Baltimore – perhaps in time to pitch in a July 9 doubleheader.
Red Sox: Three interleague games at Washington, where RHP Rick Porcello (9-3, 3.60 ERA) faces former Detr A teenager among men, Juan Soto has impressed his teammates on the Washington Nationals with his maturity and, even more so, his potent bat.
Soto hit a tiebreaking two-run double in the eighth inning, and Washington beat the Baltimore Orioles 4-2 Thursday night in the deciding matchup of a three-game interleague series between neighboring rivals.
Soto, a 19-year-old rookie, is batting .326 with 16 RBIs in 28 games. Starting in the cleanup spot for the first time, he drew a walk and delivered the game’s pivotal hit.
”I think we’re all amazed every single day,” Washington ace Max Scherzer said. ”He puts together great ABs. He has antics and has some flair. He’s a great young player. He’s just enjoying himself.”
Bryce Harper led off the eighth with a double off Mychal Givens (0-4) and Trea Turner followed with a single. After Anthony Rendon struck out http://www.dolphinsauthorizedshops.com/authentic-jason-sanders-jersey , Soto hit a liner into the gap in left-center.
”He’s got unbelievable poise,” Nationals manager Dave Martinez said of Soto. ”No matter what the situation is, he goes out there with a game plan.”
Whatever that plan is, it’s effective.
”I just try to be focused and keep working,” Soto said.
Rendon homered for the Nationals, who received seven strong innings from Scherzer and flawless work from their bullpen.
Newcomer Kelvin Herrera (1-0) pitched a 1-2-3 eighth inning and Sean Doolittle got three straight outs for his 20th save in 21 tries.
Seeking to end a rare run of two straight losses, Scherzer left a tied game after allowing two runs – both on solo homers – and striking out nine.
Afterward, the right-hander heaped praise upon Soto for the manner in which he’s adapted to playing in the big leagues.
”He has a great feel for the strike zone,” Scherzer said. ”To have that type of eye, it’s remarkable for him to be able to do that at this time and this age and this level.”
Activated from the 60-day disabled list before the game, Colby Rasmus homered for the Orioles in his first at-bat since April 6.
”Me and Max, we go way back, so I felt real good,” said Rasmus, who had been sidelined with a hip injury.
In addition, Rasmus made an outstanding throw from right field to the plate, nailing Wilmer Difo on a tag-up play in the seventh inning with the score tied.
Mark Trumbo also homered for Baltimore http://www.vikingsauthorizedshops.com/authentic-mike-remmers-jersey , his sixth of the season and third in four games.
Baltimore starter Kevin Gausman gave up two runs and four hits over six innings. The right-hander was lifted with the score tied, leaving him winless in his last seven starts.
Martinez put Harper in the leadoff spot for the first time since May for this reason: ”The thinking is if he’s hitting up top, he’ll start taking his walks again and it will get him going.” It worked. Harper walked twice.
DAVIS COMEBACK
Struggling Orioles slugger Chris Davis will start Friday night in Atlanta, manager Buck Showalter said. Davis hasn’t played since June 11, when an 0-for-5 outing against Boston dropped his batting average to .150. Since then, he’s been working on his swing and mental approach in an effort to turn around his unproductive season.
ROSTER SHUFFLE
In addition to activating Rasmus from the DL, the Orioles optioned OF Joey Rickard to Triple-A Norfolk and moved LHP Richard Bleier (latissimus tear) to the 60-day DL. Also, DH Pedro Alvarez cleared waivers and accepted an assignment to Norfolk.
Orioles: RHP Chris Tillman (back) will next pitch for Class A Delmarva after allowing three runs in two innings for lower Class A Aberdeen on Wednesday night.
Nationals: RHP Brandon Kintzler (flexor strain) is close to coming off the DL. Martinez hopes the reliever can pitch an inning on a rehabilitation assignment before being is activated. … Martinez said RHP Jeremy Hellickson (right hamstring strain) will soon go on a rehab assignment and pitch five or six innings.
Orioles: Alex Cobb (2-9, 7.14 ERA) helps Baltimore open a three-game series on the road Friday night against the Braves, who lead the NL East.
Nationals: Tanner Roark (3-7, 3.87) takes the mound in the opener of a three-game set against the visiting Philadelphia Phillies, who entered play Thursday in a second-place tie with Washington.
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Home Latest News City Council candidates focus on retaining College graduates
City Council candidates focus on retaining College graduates
Emily Martell
Candidates for Williamsburg’s City Council identified the City’s demographic imbalance as an important issue for the upcoming election, each focusing on ways to retain and attract a millennial population.
Each of the five City Council hopefuls identified the City’s small millennial workforce as an issue for Williamsburg moving forward. The candidates each pinpointed issue areas and proposed solutions in building attractive housing stock, fostering business opportunities, improving night life and drawing in current students of the College of William and Mary.
For real estate owner and life-long resident Greg Granger, the City of Williamsburg needs “absolutely, absolutely without hesitation” to improve retention of College of William and Mary graduates.
After their four years of college, Granger said students are ready to go out and conquer the world, but he thinks they should look a little closer to home — right here in Williamsburg. However, Granger admitted that Williamsburg may not be the most attractive place for recent graduates, citing a housing shortage and need for more business opportunities.
On the housing side, Granger supports investing in apartments and other housing that is attractive to young professionals. In terms of business, Granger said he sees a greater place in Williamsburg for something the College already excels at: research.
“I think we need to talk about inviting some more business models to the community for research, various types of research,” Granger said. “I think research is just a great avenue to explore because it doesn’t put a lot of strain on the infrastructure of the community … Brainpower is a great asset.”
I think we need to talk about inviting some more business models to the community for research, various types of research,” Granger said.
Another issue to Granger is downtown life. Williamsburg does not currently have a great social scene for millennials, according to him. To smooth out the demographic imbalance among residents, Granger supports facilitating a more vibrant downtown scene and expanding other events like the Winter Blues Festival.
To Vice Mayor Freiling ’83, the only incumbent in the race, building the right housing is critical. Since millennials cannot typically afford single-family homes right after graduation, Freiling said Williamsburg needs living space more attractive and feasible for that younger population.
“What we don’t have a lot of are the closely coordinated, safe, small, apartments which are within walking distance of shopping, dining, entertainment,” Freiling said.
Another deterrent Freiling cited is the lack of a social scene, which College graduates can currently get more easily in bigger cities.
“It’s about having a sense of community; it’s meeting people, it’s making new friends, it’s feeling like a part of something, and you can’t really have that until you have a critical mass of customers,” Freiling said. “So we need to get more folks to stay here so we can get more businesses coming in to cater to them, and I think it all tends to then build upon itself.”
To attract and grow these businesses, Freiling sees a greater role for Williamsburg in supporting start-ups and research opportunities, citing successes with AidData and Launchpad: The Greater Williamsburg Business Incubator, a joint venture between York County, James City County and Williamsburg.
Benming Zhang ’16 sees two main issues in attracting young professionals to the City: affordable housing and job opportunities.
“Right now, the housing stock around town is not conducive for young professionals or even young grads to want to live here,” Zhang said. “We need to find ways and incentives from the City to encourage young grads to want to live here.”
Right now, the housing stock around town is not conducive for young professionals or even young grads to want to live here,” Zhang said.
To Zhang, if Williamsburg wants to keep more graduates of the College, it needs to take action before commencement: Williamsburg should focus on involving and engaging current students in local government.
“I think the City needs to come to campus,” Zhang said. “This campus represents 50 percent of the city’s total population.”
Agreeing that the disconnect between students and Williamsburg makes it difficult for Williamsburg to retain recent graduates, Zhang said that while in office he would make sure Williamsburg hosts town halls, meetings and workshop sessions right on campus. Local resident and landlord Barbara Ramsey ’75, who is also running for a City Council seat, prefers a more realistic assessment of City Council’s ability to correct Williamsburg’s demographic imbalance.
“Part of that goes back to what the role of City Council is,” Ramsey said. “City Council’s role is to set policy, it’s not to implement it … You have to take into account too as far as Williamsburg and the size and what it’s capable of.”
Ramsey said that Williamsburg’s low number of young professionals is due to a combination of housing, downtown life and other issues. Continuing to discuss her personal experience as an alumna, Ramsey said connection with the College is an important way to retain College graduates.
“I think that it’s creating an environment that is an open environment, and one that, when students have had an opportunity to go to other places, that they want to come back,” Ramsey said.
When asked whether she had particular policy ideas for smoothing out the demographic balance, Ramsey said she supported the current City Council’s work.
“I think that the City and City Council is fairly realistic. I think perhaps some of the candidates who are running for City Council may not be in that same mindset,” Ramsey said. “I think that, you know, everyone who graduates from William and Mary isn’t going to want to come back here.”
Economics professor and member of the Williamsburg Planning Commission Elaine McBeth says she recognizes many students of the College will move away after graduation; instead, the City should focus on attracting a young professional force regardless of their origin.
“I don’t think it’s an issue of keeping our undergraduates here, but providing good jobs and housing opportunities so that we can encourage that demographic that is mid-20s to mid-30s—people that are moving into careers and finding places to live—to actually stay here,” McBeth said.
Although pointing out that Williamsburg does have millennials working in the City, McBeth noted many are opting to commute, living elsewhere.
To counteract this, McBeth proposed that the City should work more closely with the human resources offices at large employers to retain the middle demographic.
Recalling her own experience as a 26 year old moving to and living in Williamburg, McBeth noted that there is a role for more mixed-use housing—most young people will have a difficult time affording the City’s single-family homes.
As for Williamsburg’s current attempts to foster an environment attractive to millennials, McBeth agreed that the City is working hard, but that there is still much to do.
College of William and Mary
retaining graduates
Previous articleFeature: 2015-16 Year in review
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Chief Staff Writer Emily Martell '19 is a prospective economics major from Norfolk, VA. She formerly served as Associate News Editor.
‘You have to have a real crazy belief in yourself’: Glenn Close ’74 on life as an actress, dealing with uncertainty
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Beast's Lair > Type-Moon > Fanfics > Fanfic General Discussion > Fiction colab. disscussion and development.
View Full Version : Fiction colab. disscussion and development.
The idea I’ve had as of late floating around in my head was to do a work based in Fuyuki city but broaden it to be more general and include characters from all of the tm trinity (something like those fan books where the characters are in a café but less confined) it occurred then that such a story in the hands of a single person would be unwieldy and biased or lopsided when it came to character inclusion.
As a result I’m looking to find a few people interested in helping me develop this further.
The basic idea is that the story takes place after fate and uses the anime’s circuit transfer instead of sex thus leaving Shirou and Saber close but not unbreakably so. The servants are back via the WTF school of magic and Each character would have their own continuous story (overseen by one of the collaborators) that would interweave into the big story.
I’ll take questions if you have any. I’m hoping this will appeal to a few people.
Saber-Keyne
Ryougi Shiki-Leopardbear
Shirou-Ace
Sakura-Mike
Archer-Elf
Rin-Racinger
Lantz, not "anime circuit transfer" for Christ's sake, but the circuit transfer from Realta Nua.
How do you plan to work out the setting? It'll be just Fuyuki City?
it happened in both calling it one of the other is semantics bro besides that more people have seen the anime so it's better to cover my bases.
for the moment confining it to the city seems best. after the continuity is established we could expand it further out but for control sake fuyuki seems like the best bet.
Do you plan the Emiya House hold to be Hollow Ataraxish? You know, with the girls' love level set on default = 5?
I hadn't planned on it at the start and the girls development in that manner would be up to the fellow colab writers. although obviously Saber would have some connection to him given that it follows fate.
Though, if it's after Fate it means they're in love.
Well that won't end well.
Seems interesting....
I'd certainly be willing to help with this.
I'm aware of their feelings being present but I would think there would be a bit of hesitation on both there parts about it. after all saber would certainly feel awkward given the implications of return to life.
Edit: thus i feel that while there could be a chance to follow up on their relation ship that it's up to the colab writers.
So, you're saying that there is a bias towards a Saber/Shirou relationship here, due to it following Fate?
Well, it does sound like it's not really totally neutral ground here, though....
Called it.
Well, Lantz did say to me that it would be neutral in nature, but Keyne seems to think otherwise....
Walls of Text incoming?!
no, although i be disturbed if she felt nothing for the guy who ripped nerves out to save her life. it's up to the colab writers to discuss
So you mean that Mike and Keyne get to yell at each other to try and work it out.
The only way to set this on neutral ground is by making a harem, where all love is equal. That's why I asked if this would be a hollow ataraxish kind of thing.
Among other things.
nothing is ever exactly equal but this is neutral it's wholly up to the colab writers to discuss how the individual stories intertwine
sigh no leo I should hope it doesn't go like that.
The only way to set this on neutral ground is by making a harem, where all love is equal.
absolutely not Keyne. that'll just turn the whole thing into a gag.
So you get control of one character and you all decide the story together?
Sounds like an RP with no GM 0.o
Sounds like... chaos.
Now imagine if TheSpy, Mike, and Keyne were a colabs together.
Yes! Yes! Yes! And add Alf, because Tsuki needs representation in that.
Meep!
Shiki needs to be in this.
In-N-Out Double-Double & Animal Fries
sounds like walls and walls and walls and walls of text
Well, true, but then Saber doesn't feel "nothing" for Shirou in UBW or even HF.
Well, if you're expecting us to pick which character Shirou should be with out of Saber and Sakura, it almost certainly will, because neither of us have any reason to give ground and we both have equally strong arguments. Neither pairing is more "natural" here, so neither of us have any reason to accept the other's pairing.
That just ain't going to happen.
Keyne I can work with just fine, but TheSpy is a total asshole (and I'm not talking about his opinions of Sakura, either), and there's no way in hell I could collaborate with him. If he were involved, I would not be.
Get Spy in here now! (MASSIVE KIDDING)
Now we need a devoted Rin/Shirou shipper to make all the heroines evenly represented.
that's kinda my point. the ties are there but in this case aren't around the pair's necks.
pushing a pairing would be kind of inappropriate. it should evolve from the indivual stories themselves and how they interact rather then just pushing a pairing non stop.
RacingeR
Great, now we gotta convince IRUN to get in on this, and then it's perfect.
alfhelm? i dunno, while i agree tsuki needs representation he and i would have to have a serious talk before we collaborated on anything
I am sad, no one mentioned me.
Doesn't it go without saying you would get Archer?
What do you mean by a serious talk?
I simply assumed you would see the thread and presume yourself welcome, after all you're loved by everybody Elf.
Elf is here to save the day~
Well, you're hardly likely to have much shipping competition, and indeed you're likely to have quite a lot of help....
put simply he's got some very odd ideas regarding character perception, behavior and so on and further given his attitude at certain points i'm wary of his ability to work in a group
particularly with me at the head of such a project.
I'd doubt that.
There's not a lot of hardcore Rin/Archer shippers around here.
No, but if Rin is with Archer then she's not competing for Shirou....
hey i am 98% for that pairing
I see what you're trying to do but....
Thing is, this is supposed to be a collaboration. And we all have different interpretations on our preferred characters, other characters, and how our characters will view/interact with other characters. It's an ambitious project I will say that.
So whose representing who so far?
no one has directly confirmed their participation and over sight of a character yet. although there's been some implication that Keyne would be dealing with Saber and Mike might do sakura or rider.
Thing is, this is supposed to be a collaboration. And we all have different interpretations on our character, other characters, and how our characters will view/interact with other characters. It's an ambitious project I will say that.
well obviously it's ambitious. if it wasn't I wouldn't have made my opening statement as i did. I think it can work as most of us are reasonably.
Can we choose any character we want or are some restricted?
as long as it's within the main three (KnK, tsukihime and FSN) they're ok
So, what exactly would we be doing if we were driving a char?
I probably shouldn't be saying this, but for the lolz, I claim Shirou.
determining the story behind that Character. what they do, where they go and what they do, in a lot of ways it's similar to roleplaying leopard. except that the story at large is decided by the group and the fate's of characters are discussed. since I'm the head I'd be actually doing the writing presumably
you trollin ace? or yous seriouz?
Ryougi dibs, in that case.
I'm serious, the lolz part comes from the fact I'll be seeing arguments about why Shirou should be with X. Or Shirou wouldn't do Y and would do Z instead because that helps get him together with X.
IGNORE ALL ARGUMENTS, SLEEP WITH TOUKO
alright I'll update the front page
I'm serious,
very well i'll update the front page, i look forward to great things from both of you.
NAH, SHIROU'S SLEEPING WITH SACCHIN. TROLOLOLO I'm joking obviously. If that wasn't clear enough.
ISN'T IS SAD, FATE?
Isn't it great Sacchin? ^_^
If I claim Rin, what does that mean?
I mean, lantz does the writting, doesn't he? Then I am just like... overseeing what Rin does and how she reacts to things and etc?
that's somewhat correct. the colab writers oversee their chosen character and that character's personal story and how that story interacts with the other stories to make the story at large. the difference between this and role playing is that the writers have input at every level of the project and not just the character side.
Lantz, just one thing. Make this non-ero. We already have F&F for the ero stuff.
Also, I will oversee Saber's issues.
very good. and yes it'll be non ero in practice although if characters (say Rin and Archer) are in a relationship such can be implied ala PG 13.
Well, I'll pick Sakura, then.
RAPE SHIROU FOR HIS OWN GOOD: GREAT SUCCESS
It's not rape if it's not unwanted. :p
I think I am going to pass on Rin, since it wouldn't be fair to the ArcherxRin shippers.
. . . I'm going to shock everyone and ask for Archer.
done page updated you got him. so i think we should start discussing what we want to do with these characters for the first episode.
...Is Assassin still attached to the gate?
Then I will oversee his actions.
... It is my duty as a Kojiro fan to get him included as often as I possibly can. He's ignored a lot in fanfics ;_;
How long is this after Fate route?
very well
we haven't discussed it but i would say shortly thereafter in general
I changed opinions. I am taking Rin.
What changed your mind?
You call me? :3
What do you need me for?
Dunno. I can't really handle writting the canon characters, but I am able to oversee them just fine. Also it may be a pretty good challenge. And a good challenge for Archer too xD.
Claim Ilya, IRUN! You know you want too!
noted Race, now for those of you who are over seeing characters i want you to pick a goal for the character in the short term as these stories are episodic and will wind together as we go the goal doesn't have to be spectacular right away. it could be making tea/dinner fixing stuff etcetera the average stuff the characters do if you feel like it.
the things to note are firstly that the servants are alive AND connected to their masters. they don't need the link to live but they do need it to fuel their superhuman abilities.
and secondly once you have a goal for the character while it's not required a title for the episodes involving the goal is welcomed.
and lastly the episodes happen at the same time so the longest episode sets the bar for the length of an episode.
Time this takes place after KnK?
Good god 6000th post.
as far as i'm aware yes
No, how long afterwards? It matters.
a couple of months after the grail war and that takes place in 2000 apparently.
Well, that means that there's a good chance Ryougi has Mana.
is that a problem leopard?
No, I just need to know whether I have a baby, am significantly pregnant, or neither.
I though Ryougi got pregnant in 2001 actually. so she shouldn't be expecting.
alright after a while of thinking i'm back on this with a real plot in mind. so who's still on board?
Always on board for Ryougi.
I'm on board for Sakura.
On board for Kotomine and/or Gil
Or rather, I would be, but I think I might not have the time for this, what with uni coming up.
it's going to be developed in sections Eddy. you don't have to contribute a mountain or anything, just get back to me for clarification on how you want Gil to develop or interact.
That should be all right, then. It'll be a fic, rather than an RP, right?
Milbunk
Hmm, do you think it would be possible for me to enter into this with Fabro?
yes it's a fic rather then an RP. hence why it's in the fanfic section section
Think he means Nero Chaos.
I would think his role would be rather confined. I mean he's not like Gil or kirei who can really live through being a bad guy.
And thus the powers of the Beast's lair gathered and spawned the greats work of fiction even seen. An unequalled tale of love, bravery friendship is magic and magic.
Or is this going to be littered with Wall of text Bad ends?
I'm gonna grab me some snacks........
Eh that's fine with me, I'm sure I can find something good for him. (I think he deserves some more popularity, he might be insane now but he wasn't always so evil.)
wait so this would be BEFORE he went all looney tunes?
And thus the powers of the Beast's lair gathered and spawned the greats work of fiction even seen. An unequalled tale of love, bravery friendship and magic.
Or is this going to be littered with Bad ends?
it'll be a straight story developed by the participants
Nero isn't really insane, imo. He strikes me as more of a scientist- he himself said all he really wanted was to learn what he was going to become, and the fact that he didn't just go for the most powerful beasts, but rather, went for the rarest and strangest...
Yeah that's one of the biggest reasons I like him. He only really starting going all beast like when he got really close to becoming true Chaos. In fact he even thanked Shiki for killing him and restoring his sanity right before he died.
Nero isn't really insane
he's a collaboration of minds, basically crazy. I mean he's not SHIKI or such but she kinda wacky.
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film tv & new media
News Tournées Film Festival 2018/19
61 Universities Selected for the Tournées Film Festival 2018/19
Image: "BPM (Beats Per Minute)" directed by Robin Campillo
Tournées Film Festival is a program of the FACE Foundation, in partnership with the Cultural Services of the French Embassy, which aims to bring French cinema to American colleges and university campuses. Our objective in providing nearly $200,000 in Tournées Film Festival grants every year is to fund festival endeavors that can eventually become permanent and self-sustaining.
Below is the list of the 61 universities selected to receive a Tournées Film Festival grant for the 2018/2019 academic year :
Elon University, Elon, NC
North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC
Morehouse College, Atlanta, GA
Western Oregon University, Monmouth, OR
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL
Georgia Gwinnett College, Lawrenceville, GA
Samford University, Birmingham, AL
Kenyon College, Gambier, OH
Ashland University, Ashland, OH
MiraCosta College, Oceanside, CA
Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD
Boston University, Boston, MA
Lafayette College, Easton, PA
University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK
Murray State University, Murray, KY
UNC Charlotte, Charlotte, NC
Indiana University, Bloomington, IN
Emory University, Atlanta, GA
McDaniel College, Westminster, MD
Wofford College, Spartanburg, SC
West Texas A & M University, Canyon, TX
Holyoke Community College, Holyoke, MA
University of Wisconsin Marathon County, Wausau, WI
Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA
Cape Fear Community College, Wilmington, NC
University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC
Florida Southwestern State College, Naples, FL
Texas Lutheran University, Seguin, TX
Westminster College, New Wilmington, PA
Bates College, Lewiston, ME
Saint Michael's College, Winooski, VT
Central Washington University, Ellensburg, WA
Pacific University, Forest Grove, OR
California Institute of the Arts, Valencia, CA
Cornell University, Ithaca, NY
University of North Alabama, Florence, AL
Carson-Newman University, Jefferson City, TN
Missouri Southern State University, Joplin, MO
Truman State University, Kirksville, MO
Ball State University, Muncie, IN
Pierce College, Woodland Hills, CA
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, NC
Salve Regina University, Newport, RI
Pacific Lutheran University, Tacoma, WA
Wabash College, Crawfordsville, IN
San Diego State University, San Diego, CA
Western Washington University, Bellingham, WA
University of Central Arkansas, Conway, AR
North Dakota State University, Fargo, ND
University of South Carolina, Sumter, SC
University of Wisconsin, La Crosse, WI
University of Rochester, Rochester, NY
Boise State University, Boise, ID
University of Cincinnati - Blue Ash College, Cincinnati, OH
Clemson University, Clemson, SC
Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS
Central Michigan University, Mount Pleasant, MI
Portland State University, Portland, OR
Illinois College, Jacksonville, IL
CUNY-College of Staten Island, Staten Island, NY
UW-Milwaukee, Milwaukee, WI
MORE IN FILM, TV & NEW MEDIA
Focus on Robert Bresson at Anthology
Henri Verneuil's popular cinema at MoMI
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Spanish Honor Society promotes Spanish language and culture in community
WHS Spanish Honor Society
By Elizabeth Richards
The Spanish Honor Society (SHS) at Windham High School is a group of highly dedicated, high achieving students who enjoy Spanish and help promote the language and Hispanic culture in their community.
Club officers this year are Annika Johnston (President, senior), Maddie Fox (Vice President, senior), Emily Magoon (Secretary, junior), Annie Stevens (Treasurer, senior) and Sarah Symalla (Aguilitos coordinator, junior).
The club operates periodic Kids’ Night Out events to raise money for activities and scholarships. Parents can drop their children from preschool to fifth grade at the event, where they participate in Spanish related activities and games, Johnston said.
The event, which happens a few times each year, allows parents a chance to go out on their own, gives the students in the club a chance to spend time with the younger kids, and is a good fundraiser for the club, Magoon said.
Fox said that there are many children who return each time the event is held. When they leave, they say they’re already looking forward to the next one, she said. “It’s just really great to have that experience with them and get them to start enjoying Spanish at a young age,” Fox said.
The next Kids’ Night Out won’t be until next school year. Parents of elementary children receive notice of the event through the school list serve.
Fundraisers support the annual $1000 scholarship the club awards to a graduating senior. The club also occasionally funds scholarships for students taking trips to other countries, Johnston said.
Since 2002, the club has offered a program, Aguilitos (little eagles), specifically intended to promote Spanish with younger children. Through this program, club members plan and present lessons to groups of elementary children on a regular basis.
Magoon said “It’s really cool to watch them learn and remember all these words and be able to put things together throughout the year.” She said she enjoys the relaxed, but educational environment, and being able to nurture the younger kids and watch them grow. This year, she said, the group she’s been with has completed several units, including colors, numbers, animals and days of the week.
Another activity of the SHS is a luncheon for staff, where club members bring in Spanish foods they have prepared. “That’s really cool too, to get to know more about the culture through cooking,” Magoon said. She added that she thinks SHS is important because it gives her an opportunity for social connection in a different way.
“I think that what we’re doing is important, especially for those of us who really want to study in Spanish and foreign language,” Johnston said. “Also, giving back to our seniors and elementary schoolers is an important aspect of what we do,” she added.
Magoon said “It’s really important, I think, to get kids involved in languages because of the way our world is today. There’s so much global interaction now, ways that we can talk to other people, and I think languages are really important for that. A lot of other countries start English early on, so I think it’s a really good opportunity that we provide here at WHS in getting kids involved early on.”
Advisor Trish Soucy said, “Being in SHS gives students the opportunity to spread cultural awareness,” said SHS Advisor Trish Soucy. “Being a part of these activities helps students make a connection with the Spanish they are learning in class and how it can be used in a positive way in the community.”
Labels: 2019, culture, Elizabeth Richards, Kids Night Out, Raymond, Spanish Honor Society, The Windham Eagle, Windham, Windham High School
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(SUKAN) YODSANKLAI IWE FAIRTEX AND RODTANG JITMUANGNON SPEARHEAD OPEN WORKOUT IN BANGKOK
Mar. 01 Sukan no comments
1 March 2019 – Bangkok, Thailand: The largest global sports media property in Asian history, ONE Championship™ (ONE), recently held an Open Workout at The Motif Boxing BKK Gym in Bangkok, Thailand last Friday, 1 March, featuring Muay Thai superstars Yodsanklai IWE Fairtex and Rodtang“Iron Man” Jitmuangnon. Both men are set to compete in separate bouts at ONE: A NEW ERA, which takes place at the iconic Ryogoku Kokugikan in Tokyo, Japan on Sunday, 31 March.
Ticket information for ONE: A NEW ERA is available at www.onefc.com.
Yodsanklai IWE Fairtex, ONE Athlete, stated: “I am honored and excited to be part of ONE Championship’s first-ever show in Tokyo, Japan, a country with a rich background and love for martial arts. More importantly, I have the opportunity to avenge a previous loss to Andy Souwer, and I get to do it in front of the Japanese fans. I promise to deliver an exciting performance for everyone there.”
Rodtang Jitmuangnon, ONE Athlete, stated: “To be able to compete in ONE Championship means a lot to me, and to be able to compete in their first-ever event in Japan is an absolute honor for me. To be able to compete in a world-class organization such as this, it is not something that every athlete can say. ONE Championship chose me to be part of their show in Japan. It means a lot to me because they believe in my talent as an athlete. I’m really happy to be in this position. I promise that I won’t disappoint the Japanese fans on March 31st.”
Multiple-time Muay Thai World Champion Yodsanklai IWE Fairtex is one of the most popular and accomplished strikers in the world. Born in Northeast Thailand, Yodsanklai won close to 200 professional bouts against many fellow Muay Thai legends. In the process, he captured several prestigious titles, including three Lumpinee Stadium World Championships, two Lion Fight World Championships, two WMC World Championships, and a WBC World Title. The lure of testing his skills amongst the world’s best strikers in ONE Super Series has drawn him to ONE Championship, and he now finds himself competing on the toughest proving ground of martial arts competition. The legendary warrior now looks to continue his dominance in the ONE Championship arena. He returns to action against Dutch World Champion kickboxer Andy Souwer at ONE: A NEW ERA.
Rodtang “The Iron Man” Jitmuangnon is one of the most recognizable names in the world of Muay Thai, capturing the Omnoi Stadium World Championship on two occasions. Known for his exciting Muay Mat style, which specializes in devastating strikes and always looks to charge forward to instantly inflict damage, Rodtang has beaten some of Thailand’s biggest Muay Thai superstars. Following his two impressive performances on the ONE Super Series stage, Rodtang eyes to inch himself closer to a possible ONE World Title shot by testing his mettle against two-time Muay Thai World Champion Hakim Hamech at ONE: A NEW ERA.
For more updates on ONE Championship, please visit www.onefc.com, follow us on Twitter and Instagram @ONEChampionship, and like us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/ONEChampionship.
Tags: and, Bangkok, In, ONE Championship’s, OPEN WORKOUT, RODTANG JITMUANGNON, SPEARHEAD, YODSANKLAI IWE FAIRTEX
← (SUKAN) EMETRIOUS JOHNSON AND EDDIE ALVAREZ LEAD ONE CHAMPIONSHIP LAS VEGAS OPEN WORKOUT
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The Refugee Education Center
Home / Nonprofit / The Refugee Education Center
Founded in 2006 by refugees and immigrants, The Refugee Education Center (REC) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The mission of REC is to support refugee children and families to gain the necessary skills for seamless and successful integration into the community through comprehensive educational support, youth development services, and fostering cultural knowledge and understanding. As the only organization of its kind in West Michigan, REC has a strong history of success in engaging schools and families in meeting the unique needs of refugee students. Through partnerships with local refugee resettlement agencies and schools, REC is able to walk alongside refugee newcomers as they enter the U.S. school system—continuing services past the resettlement period, for however long it takes to ensure refugee students succeed in school so that they can succeed in their new community.
Since 2006, REC has served 80-100 students a year from countries such as Burma, Bhutan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Somalia, and Sudan, with 80% of participants achieving key academic markers, such as reading scores. Our primary services include:
Student Support: Including after-school homework help (Monday through Thursday from 4–6 PM throughout the school year); a 7-week summer reading program with weekly educational field trips; a leadership program focused on promoting volunteerism and college readiness; and peer support groups that provide social and emotional support to newly arriving refugee students.
Parent Engagement: This includes school liaison service, school orientation and enrollment, assistance with parent-teacher conferences, and parent workshops.
School Engagement: We facilitate community collaboration across school districts serving refugees through our Converging Paths Collaborative and annual conference. The Converging Paths Conference provides information and resources to those working with refugee students and families in our community’s schools and promotes promising practices for reducing the rate at which refugee students leave school without a degree. Our staff is also made available for professional development trainings and consultation with schools upon request.
Holland Free Health Clinic
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Villa Nobel
List of Countries » Italy » Genoa and Liguria » Villa Nobel
Villa Nobel in Sanremo (Corso Cavallotti, 116) was bought by Alfred Nobel in 1891. After important arrangements, in 1893 the Villa was ready for Nobel's needs, with some rooms for visitors, a laboratory, a stable and a private pier for his experiments on the seashore. Nobel spent in the Villa the most of his last years and died in it on December 10, 1896.
The Villa, now a property of the Province of Imperia, was deeply restored at the end of 20th Century and, from 2002, hosts a Museum and a conference center as well as some rooms of the original Nobel's house.
More info in the Villa's official website.
Photos by Luca Borghi ti.supmacinu|ihgrob.l#| (August 2010), courtesy of Dr. Franco Massa, Director.
Alfred Nobel's bust
Ascanio Sobrero's bust
- Giovanni e Antonella Lotti, Nobel a Sanremo. La villa, il museo, i Premi Nobel italiani, Allemandi & C., Torino 2009, pp. 232.
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Accueil » Lexique stratigraphique » Province de Churchill » Formation d’Hellancourt – en
Hellancourt Formation
Stratigraphic label: [ppro]he
Map symbol: pPhe
First published: 2 May 2018
pPhe6 Amphibolitized basalt
pPhe5 Plagioclase porphyritic (spotted) basalt
pPhe4 Mafic pyroclastics
pPhe3 Black slate, locally pyritic, and biotite schist
pPhe2 Massive basalt
pPhe1 Pillow basalt
pPhe Massive or pillow basalt, some mafic and sedimentary pyroclastic rocks, mudrock and amphibolite
Author: Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965
Reference section: Hellancourt Lake area (NTS sheet 24K04)
Type area: Hellancourt Lake area (NTS sheet 24K04)
Geological subdivision: New Quebec Orogen / Labrador Trough / Gérido and Payne lithotectonic zones
Lithology: Basalt, gabbro, mudrock, pyroclastic rocks and amphibolite
Type: Lithostratigraphic
Rank: Formation
Koksoak Group
Baby Formation
The unit was originally described by Sauvé and Bergeron (1965) during geological mapping of the Gerido and Thévenet lakes area. These authors named the volcanic rocks that make up the formation after the Hellancourt Lake (NTS sheet 24K04) where the formation was studied in detail. It was then mapped by Bérard (1965) near the Trough’s western margin south of Bérard Lake (sheet 24L08), by Clark (1979, 1980) in the Koksoak River area south of latitude 58°N and in the Roberts Synclinal north of Kangirsuk in the far north of the Labrador Trough (Hardy, 1976; Bilodeau and Caron-Côté, 2018).
Hellancourt Formation (pPhe): Massive or Pillow Basalt, Some Mafic and Sedimentary Pyroclastic Rocks, Mudrock and Amphibolite
The Hellancourt Formation is part of the Koksoak Group and comprises the majority of mafic volcanic rocks of the Labrador Trough’s second volcano-sedimentary cycle (Clark and Wares, 2004). Most rocks have the peculiarity of being similar from a compositional, petrographic and chemical perspective. They were initially defined as a sequence consisting of massive lava at the base and an abundance of pillow lava at the top (Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965).
In the Roberts Synclinal area, north of Kangirsuk (sheet 25D01), the unit subdivides from the base to the top into an undifferentiated sequence (pPhe) composed of basalt, characterized by the absence of a particular texture, and containing speckled (spotted) gabbro. These are interpreted as sills or coarse-grained flows. Spotted lavas are found mainly at the sequence’s base, but also at a few higher levels (Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965). The thickest gabbro passages are grouped into the pPhe5 unit. This unit is first overlain by pillow basalt (pPhe1), then massive basalt (pPhe2), some of which are intruded by gabbro Sills (pPhe5) and some of which contain thin horizons of black slate (pPhe3), some of which are sulphidic. Basalt with higher metamorphism was recrystallized to hornblende amphibolite (pPhe6). A mafic pyroclastics’ unit (pPhe4) was recognized in the north-central part of the Labrador Trough (Goulet, 1986), but has no identified equivalent in the Kangirsuk region. The only intrusive rocks observed are gabbro sills. No volcanic chimneys or feeding dykes were identified. The assumption is that feeding dykes are located outside the region. It is also possible that folds complicate interpretation (Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965).
Hellancourt basalt samples collected in 2017 show a signature of tholeiitic affinity. Immobile element ratios of Nb/Y and Zr/TiO2 allow characterization of the chemical evolution of magma over time (Winchester and Floyd, 1977). The results show Zr/TiO2 ratios with no significant variation, indicating a homogeneous basalt composition at the boundary of transitional basalts. Nb/Y ratios show a slightly more alkaline composition of the basal half (pPhe and pPhe5) than those of the summital half (pPhe1 and pPhe2). Rare earth profiles indicate a greater fractionation of the magma at the base of the sequence and a summit derived from a less evolved source or with less residence time in the crust.
Hellancourt Formation 1 (pPhe1): Pillow Basalt
The pillow basalt unit of the Hellancourt Formation (pPhe1) is composed of homogeneous, aphanitic rock forming decimetric to metric pillows. The rock is generally massive, but includes schistose zones attributed either to small horizons containing sediments, small deformation corridors, or to more carbonated, chloritized or altered basalt. The unit contains an unestimated percentage of gabbro, generally interpreted as metric to decametric intrusions, conformable and contemporaneous to other Hellancourt units (pPhe, pPhe2 and pPhe5). The unit also contains multiple decimetric, 3 m thick horizons of schistose black mudrock (pPhe3), sometimes graphic or sulphidic.
Pillows are joint and generally well individualized by chilled margins compossed of dark coloured and aphanitic material. Their structure is in the form of mattresses, buns or balls (Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965). Pillows are generally not vesicular (Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965), but the upper half of the unit contains tabular cavities (Clark, 1980). The top of the pillows contains elongated metric quartz and carbonate nodules interpreted as amygdules, which are common in the Roberts Synclinal area (sheets 25C04 and 25D01). There is little interpillow space filled with scoria, lava balls, quartz and carbonate (Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965). Polygonal joints are also observed locally. Also, centimetric to decimetric levels of brecciated or highly fractured material may correspond to hyaloclastite facies.
Typical samples of pillow basalt from the Roberts Synclinal area are homogeneous, massive and aphanitic to very fine-grained for the most part and fine to medium-grained for the others. The alteration patina is typically brownish and can be locally confused with that of an ultramafic rock. The fresh surface is usually light grey-greenish with rare shades of bluish grey or dark to blackish blue.
The unit has a microlithic texture, consisting of about 50% of a plagioclase, quartz, micas (chlorite and sericite), small acicular amphiboles and epidote matrix. The rock is composed of up to 50% small phenocrystals (< 5 mm) of acicular minerals interpreted, in most samples, as actinolite or tremolite. The rock often appears to be altered, as evidenced by pseudomorphs of plagioclase phenocrystals. Alteration and metamorphism parageneses are repeated from place to place. Chlorite, carbonates and metal minerals are minor constituents in most samples. Carbonates are found in both the matrix, veins and small phenocrystals. Secondary epidote usually appears as a late phase in small euhedral crystals in a few samples. Glass is sometimes still visible under the microscope (Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965).
Pillow basalts are locally cut by irregular and discontinuous thin veins, a few millimetres to a few centimetres-thick, cross-cutting stratification, or in extension cracks associated with deformation zones. These veins are composed of quartz, quartz-carbonate, quartz-carbonate-chlorite, carbonate only or chlorite only. They predate metamorphism and deformation as they are cut by amphiboles. They are particularly common on the edges and between pillows and zones containing mudrock interbeds. Carbonate and chlorite veins are common in sulphide zones.
The gabbro’s petrography and geochemistry are quite similar to those of the basalt. Gabbro is differentiated by its fine to medium grain size and its altered amphibole or plagioclase phenocrystal content, providing a characteristic speckled texture.
Hellancourt Formation 2 (pPhe2): Massive Basalt
The massive basalt unit (pPhe2) shares several compositional and structural characteristics with the pillow basalt unit (pPhe1) above it. Part of this unit may correspond to the massive, schistose basalt of the undifferentiated unit (pPhe), but does not contain speckled basalt (or very little), a facies interpreted either as gabbro sills or coarse-grained lava. Massive basalt contains low-carbonate, friable black shale horizons and rare medium-grained horizons, interpreted as a microgabbro. Some of these intrusions could be ultramafic. The relationship between basalt and gabbro is often ambiguous, as contact is unclear and difficult to distinguish. These correspond to zones that are particularly rich in carbonates, as evidenced by the presence of small calcite clusters. Geochemical similarity also complicates the mapping of flows and sills.
The unit is usually composed of massive, homogeneous rock, fine to very fine-grained, even aphanitic, rarely marked by a deformation fabric. It is characterized by very low structural and compositional variability. The colour of the rock is similar to that of pillow basalt, which is beige-greenish in altered surface and greenish grey in fresh exposure. Distinctive components are in the presence of coarse plagioclase and amphibole crystals dominated by actinolite and, to a lesser extent, tremolite and hornblende. These minerals are generally sericitized and chloritized. A second generation of chlorite crystallized in parallel lath clusters marks the main schistosity, accentuating the lepidoblastic texture in places. Titanite is a minor phase, but it is characteristic of the Hellancourt Formation as a whole. Other matrices and secondary minerals include epidote, quartz and up to 2% disseminated sulphides, including framboidal pyrite. The rock contains very little carbonate, but dissolved cavities are frequently observed in outcrop. Another feature of this unit is the presence of centimetric chlorite porphyroblasts distributed heterogeneously in the rock. The latter indicate that the rock has been metamorphosed to greenschist facies, or even upper greenschist facies for areas containing hornblende. Garnet was not observed in this unit.
The schistose horizons conformable with stratification’s origin has not been further developed. Schistosity is local, not penetrative, and does not appear to be associated with specific petrographic variations, lithological changes, or shear corridors. Instead, deformed zones have anastomosed schistosity, rock discolouration, fracturing, silicification, or an abundance of quartz or carbonate veins and black chlorite veinlets.
Hellancourt Formation 3 (pPhe3): Black Slate, Locally Pyritic, and Biotite Schist
Horizons of interstratified slate in the volcanic pile form sedimentary units of low extension and thickness ranging from <10 m to >30 m (Clark, 1980; Fournier, 1981; Wares and Goutier, 1989). The rock has thin, commonly wavy laminae. In places, current ripples and cross-bedding are observed (Clark, 1980). Slate is usually graphic and locally pyritic. It is black or dark grey in fresh exposure and rusty in altered surface due to pyrite oxidation, which is usually observed in thin laminas parallel to bedding and in cubic crystals (Clark, 1980; Fournier, 1981). Graphic black slate horizons are sedimentary or volcano-sedimentary (Clark, 1980).
In the Roberts Synclinal area, the unit consists of a few very fine-grained slate schist beds. This rock is black in fresh exposure and shows a completely altered and friable rust-coloured surface. Schist is composed of quartz (33-67%), biotite (20-54%), muscovite (0-12%), chlorite (0-16%), epidote (0-8%) and plagioclase (1-25%). Accessory minerals are hornblende, microcline, garnet, opaque minerals, calcite, apatite and tourmaline (Hardy, 1976).
Hellancourt Formation 4 (pPhe4): Mafic Pyroclastics
Mafic pyroclastics (pPhe4) interstratified in the basalt sequence are scarce in the Hellancourt Formation. They include mafic pyroclastic rocks, flow top breccias, pillow breccias and rarely mafic tuff and chert. Volcanic breccias form horizons ranging in thickness from 0.3 to 1 m (Fournier, 1981) and up to 5 m (Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965). These brecciated horizons are interbedded with pillow basalt flows or form the summit of pillow or massive flows (Clark, 1979, 1980; Fournier, 1981). They are composed of fragmented basaltic material with structures that resemble small pillows (Clark, 1980). The fragments, angular, subrounded or irregular in shape, have a diameter ranging from <1 cm to about 30 cm and a tight arrangement. The matrix is composed of carbonate, quartz and chlorite (Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965; Clark, 1979, 1980; Fournier, 1981). Basaltic tuff is present in horizons of a few metres thick (Clark, 1980).
A 3 m thick flow breccia of hyaloclastic material was observed by Goulet (1986) at Baie-aux-Feuilles (sheet 24K13). Goulet (1995) also reported the presence of channelized conglomerates interbedded between pillow basalt flows. Conglomerate beds are less than 3 m thick. They consist of vesicular lava, pyritic gabbro, mudrock and pyrite fragments. Pebbles are rounded to subrounded and rarely exceed 10 cm in diameter. The matrix, characterized by a very dark colour, is composed of reworked tuff (Goulet, 1995).
Hellancourt Formation 5 (pPhe5): Plagioclase Porphyritic (Spotted) Basalt
Unit pPhe5 groups outcrops where the speckled metagabbro and porphyritic basalt predominate over other basaltic units of the Hellancourt Formation. In the Roberts Synclinal area, this unit is predominantly present in the massive to schistose basalt at the volcanic sequence’s base (pPhe). The rock is characterized by homogeneity, fine to medium grain size, and a unique speckled (spotted) texture. It can be interpreted as microgabbro sills or coarse-grained lava, their composition and geochemical signature being similar to the fine-grained basalt hostrock. Contacts between gabbro and basalt are generally not marked, progressive or non-visible, which accentuates the similarities between these lithologies. Sill thickness is estimated to be a few tens of metres.
A variety of gabbro sills interpreted as late to post-volcanic intrusions are distinguished by sharp contacts and particularly schistose and altered basalt walls. However, their geochemical and structural affinities with the other gabbros favour their integration into the Hellancourt Formation. Other gabbros have a subophitic texture, a characteristic that is more representative of the Montagnais Sills (pPmon). However, field relationships and the nature of the contacts with the basalts support their belonging to the Hellancourt Formation.
The rock is generally mesococratic, with a brownish alteration patina that can be confused with that of basalt. It is greenish-grey to dark greenish brown in fresh exposure, giving it a locally melanocratic appearance. The main components are acicular amphiboles and plagioclase. The unit is distinguished from other Hellancourt facies by the presence of damouritized plagioclase or chloritized amphibole phenocrystals, the best criterion for their identification in the field. Few samples appear to contain some hornblende. Secondary components are chlorite, epidote, carbonate and titanite, the lalter being ubiquitous in all the facies of the Hellancourt Formation. Epidote can make up 20% of the rock, especially in small euhedral crystals of metamorphic origin, but also in veinlets or associated with altered plagioclase. Sulphides account for up to 2-3% of the rock and are concentrated in microfractures.
Rocks are commonly cut by veinlets, veins or clusters up to 5 cm wide and composed of soft blackish material interpreted as chlorite. The latter is also a constituent of quartz veins that abound in the schistosity plane, as well as carbonate, as evidenced by the dissolved cavities in the veins and surrounding rock.
Hellancourt Formation 6 (pPhe6): Amphibolized Basalt
Amphibolite of the Hellancourt Formation (pPhe6) is interpreted as a higher metamorphic grade equivalent of the other Hellancourt units. The complete loss of primary structures associated with metamorphism does not make it possible to know with certainty which of the original units the rock belongs. In the field, rocks of the pPhe6 unit may be confused with some dark-coloured metasediments. Amphibolite is generally grey to dark green to blackish.
The rock is fine to very fine-grained, granoblastic, equigranular and generally mesocratic and banded. Amphibolite is composed on average of 60% amphibole and 40% plagioclase. Amphibole bands are largely dominated by stocky recrystallized hornblende, with rare actinolite. Non-twinned plagioclase crystals combine with quartz to form alternating leucocratic bands. South of the Arnaud River (sheets 24N12 and N13), amphibolite is composed of approximately 5% coronitic garnet, resulting from a higher metamorphic pressure than that which affected rocks of the Roberts Synclinal. Garnet is medium-grained, poikilitic with quartz or plagioclase inclusions, homogeneously distributed and surrounded by quartz.
The Hellancourt Formation is part of the Labrador Trough’s second volcano-sedimentary cycle. It outcrops in the north-central (southwest of Kuujjuaq) to the far north of the Trough (north of Kangirsuk). In the Kuujjuaq region, unit thickness was estimated to be between 1000 and 1500 m on a regional fold’s western flank, reduced in thickness on the eastern flank due to a shear zone (Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965). In the Kangirsuk region, the Hellancourt Formation is the thickest of Paleoproterozoic units. In the Roberts Synclinal, the unit’s thickness also varies significantly due to the presence of numerous local folds and imbrication of the sequence along thrust fronts east of the synclinal. Its thickness is roughly estimated at a minimum of 1500 m on the east side and up to 8000 m on the west side.
A glomerophyric gabbro dyke intruding the Hellancourt Formation’s summital strata was analyzed to constrain the age of the end of volcanism in the Baie-aux-Feuilles region (Machado et al., 1997). The average results show an age of 1874 ±3 Ma that was correlated with an age of 1870 ±4 Ma obtained for a rhyodacite in the Murdoch Formation’s upper part. The authors conclude that the Hellancourt Formation’s age is 10 to 14 Ma younger than that of the Sokoman Formation’s iron formations.
The Hellancourt Formation overlies turbidites of the Menihek Formation with interlocking contact over a transition zone of at least 1 km. Cartographic contact between the two units occurs when the proportion of basalt at the top of the Menihek Formation exceeds 50% in outcrop. The unit stratigraphically overlying the Hellancourt Formation is completely eroded in the Roberts Synclinal area.
The normal polarity of the Hellancourt units is reflected in a basal undifferenciated sequence (pPhe) cut by abundant speckled gabbro sills (pPhe5), some of which are possibly progressive contact coarse-grained lava, overlain by massive flows (pPhe2), and then pillow flows (pPhe1) at the top. Some of the summital units are intruded with gabbro (pPhe5) and others contain thin horizons of black slate (pPhe3) and sulphide clusters. All contacts are sharp and interlocking. There are a few exceptions where massive flows change laterally to pillow lava (Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965). Gabbro sills (or coarse-grained flows) of the pPhe5 unit were observed alternating with mudrocks and quartz arenites of the Menihek Formation (pPme), underlying the Hellancourt Formation. The Hellancourt Formation’s base can be followed continuously in contact with the Baby Formation’s ferriferous upper member in the Kuujjuaq region, without the presence of the Menihek Formation (Sauvé and Bergeron, 1965). Finally, there does not appear to be any apparent relationship between the Hellancourt Formation and other mafic units in the region, be it the Montagnais Sills or the Baie Kyak Intrusion.
CLARK, T. – WARES, R. Lithotectonic and Metallogenic Synthesis of the New Québec Orogen (Labrador Trough). Ministère des Ressources naturelles et de la Faune, Québec; MM 2005-01, 178 pages, 1 carte. 2006 MM 2005-01
BILODEAU, C. – CARON-COTÉ, E. Géologie de la région de la rivière Arnaud, provinces du Supérieur (Minto) et de Churchill (Fosse du Labrador), secteur de Kangirsuk, Nunavik, Québec, Canada . Ministère de l’Énergie et des Ressources naturelles, Québec. 2018 Bulletin géologiQUE
FOURNIER, D. Gîtes de Cu-Zn et Cu-Ni dans la partie nord de la Fosse du Labrador. Ministère des Ressources naturelles, Québec; DPV 835, 28 pages, 3 cartes. 1981 DPV 835
CLARK, T. – WARES, R. Synthèse lithotectonique et métallogénique de l’Orogène du Nouveau Québec (Fosse du Labrador).Ministère des Ressources naturelles, des Forêts et des Parcs, Québec; MM 2004-01, 182 pages, 1 carte. 2004 MM 2004-01
SAUVÉ, P. – BERGERON, R Région des lacs Gerido et Thévenet, Nouveau Québec. Ministère des Ressources naturelles, Québec; RG 104, 141 pages, 3 cartes. 1965 RG 104
CLARK, T. Région de la rivière Koksoak (Nouveau-Québec) – Rapport préliminaire. Ministère des Ressources naturelles, Québec; DPV 781, 24 pages, 1 carte. 1980 DPV 781
CLARK, T. Région du lac Napier, (Nouveau-Québec) – Rapport préliminaire. Ministère des Ressources naturelles, Québec; DPV 663, 28 pages, 1 carte. 1979 DPV 663
KISH, L. – TREMBLAY-CLARK, P. Géochimie et radioactivité dans la fosse du Labrador (56° 00’ – 58º 30’). Ministère des Ressources naturelles, Québec; DPV 567, 73 pages. 1978 DPV 567
GOULET, N. Étude structurale, stratigraphique et géochronologique de la partie nord de la Fosse du Labrador. Ministère des Ressources naturelles, Québec; MB 95-36, 41 pages, 1 carte. 1995 MB 95-36
WARES, R. – GOUTIER, J. Synthèse métallogénique des indices de sulfures au nord du 57è parallèle – Fosse du Labrador – Rapport intermédiaire -, Étape III. Ministère de l’Énergie et des Ressources, Québec; MB 90-25, 104 pages, 2 cartes. 1990 MB 90-25
GOULET, N. Étude tectonique et stratigraphique de la partie nord de la Fosse du Labrador – Région de la baie aux Feuilles et du lac Bédard -, MRN, Québec; MB 86-27, 22 pages, 6 cartes. 1986 MB 86-27
WARES, R. – BERGER, J. Synthèse métallogénique des indices de sulfures au nord du 57è parallèle. Ministère des Ressources naturelles, Québec; MB 87-19, 15 pages, 1 carte. 1987 MB 87-19
GOULET, N Étude tectonique de la partie nord de la Fosse du Labrador (Rapport préliminaire), Ministère des Ressources naturelles, Québec; MB 87-21, 33 pages, 4 cartes. 1987 MB 87-21
WARES, R. – BERGER, J. – St-SEYMOUR, K. Synthèse métallogénique des indices de sulfures au nord du 57è parallèle (Étape I) – Fosse du Labrador -. Ministère de l’Énergie et des Ressources, Québec; MB 88-05, 202 pages, 1 carte. 1988 MB 88-05
WARES, R. – GOUTIER, J. Synthèse métallogénique des indices de sulfures au nord du 57è parallèle (Étape II) – Fosse du Labrador -. Ministère de l’Énergie et des Ressources,Québec; MB 89-38; 122 pages, 1 carte. 1989 MB 89-38
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Encyclopedia of the Blues: A-J.
However, early rock n roll DJ Alan Freed loved the record and added Hawkins to his popular Rock N Roll Review stage shows.
17 When Dread Zeppelin recorded their "disco" album, It's Not Unusual in que es escort cards 1992, producer Jah Paul Jo asked Hawkins to guest.In the 2009 film, Nowhere Boy, a vinyl record of "I Put A Spell On You" is presented to a young John Lennon, who then gives the record to his Mother, Julia, to play on a record player.Famed chiefly solo diosas putitas partuza amater for his powerful, operatic vocal delivery and wildly theatrical performances of songs such as ".He often fretted about the perception of him as a black Vincent Price, disappointed that he was never taken seriously enough to realize the operatic ambitions hed had as a teen.Rubber snakes dangled from his neck as he brandished a skull on a stick that he nicknamed Henry.6 Nonetheless it was banned from radio in some areas.In 1951, he joined the outfit of R B guitarist Tiny Grimes, whose band the Rockin Highlanders had a successful gimmick: They all wore Scottish tartan and kilts.It was at OKeh that he would establish the Halloween-friendly sound and persona that would determine the course of his career.Yet, every Halloween, songs like I Put a Spell on You and Alligator Wine brought him briefly back into view.It made him a popular attraction in performance, but it doomed him as a recording artist in an era that was still largely conservative.2 He opened for Fats Domino, Tiny Grimes and the Rolling Stones.In 1998, the Rhythm and Blues Foundation recognized him with its Pioneer Award.
Soon after the release of "I Put a Spell on You radio disc jockey Alan Freed offered Hawkins 300 to emerge from a coffin onstage.
Top R B/Hip-Hop Singles.
Cesare Rizzi, Enciclopedia della musica rock (Giunti, 1996 249.
In the 80s and 90s Hawkins continued to perform, including opening for the Rolling Stones on one of their large tours.
(performer: "I Put a Spell on You" - as Jalacy J Hawkins, uncredited) / (writer: "I Put a Spell on You" - uncredited) 2017 Prime Suspect 1973 (TV Mini-Series) (writer - 1 episode) - Episode #1.5 (2017).(performer: "I Put a Spell on You / (writer: "I Put a Spell on You 2007/I Crazy Love (Documentary) (performer: "I Put A Spell On You / (writer: "I Put A Spell On You 2007 Perfect Stranger (writer: "I Put a Spell on You".11 This song was featured in the show's Season 2 episode " Humbug ".A b c Edward.Alice Cooper, Kiss, and, marilyn Manson, as well as punk rock groups like the Misfits and the Cramps.
Subsequently, filmmaker Jim Jarmusch featured "I Put a Spell on You" on the soundtrack and deep in the plot of his film Stranger Than Paradise (1983) and then Hawkins himself as a hotel night clerk in his Mystery Train and in roles in Álex.
In July 1991, Hawkins released his album Black Music for White People.
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Tag hysteria - humanist @ roua.org :
amendment to the anti-smoking laws
Now that we live longer and some people saved me and the public from myself and other smokers by pushing laws against smoking in public places, I would suggest an amendment to these laws, which would go along the same generous lines and save the public and me from the owners/users of personal cars.
Here's the proposed amendment: each personal car should be mechanically modified so that the exhaust ends up fully inside that car.
There's a physical version of it too: each personal car should be mechanically modified so that the exhaust passes fully through the same private atmosphere, inside the car, that the driver is breathing, before getting outto the public atmosphere.
And here's the social version of this amendment: apply the physical version of the amendment only to those car owners/drivers who think that smoking means (or helps) killing other people more than the daily use of personal cars in urban areas or than the tax money spent on military activities or than the naked stupidity we, the people, are naturally endowed with in various degrees since birth.
Classified in : philosophy, karma Tags : society, hysteria, capitalism
costume and tie
Did you notice how deeply moronic looks somebody in a suit and a tie? Why do they keep wearing these horrible pieces of clothing? I find this habit atrocious. The elderly have the excuse of the '50s: factory workers had a work-suit, and their bosses a visibly different one. But the youngsters have none, unless they have to wear a uniform at school. I once heard a justification that, in a meeting, having a suit help protecting the participants from distraction. Well, if a participant has problems focusing on the meeting's subjects because of somebody else's clothing, then that one shouldn't be allowed to participate in such meetings in the first place.
My guesses on the reasons why we still tolerate this plain ugliness: 1. This is the new empire's soldiers uniform. 2. The mass production of costumes and ties is cheap(est). It's for drones, after all. 3. Most of us are morons still interpreting a suit as a sign of respectability, but this is part of point 1. 4. The tie usually helps at masking a huge belly, but why are some of those slimmer ones wearing it still? It's due to lack of taste or imagination, perhaps.
Wondering what the new empire is? Well, take a train and step down in Frankfurt Am Main. Walk towards the centre about 500 metres. Look on the right side: the obsolete centres of the empire of ignorance: the old churches; their uniform is now out-of-fashion. Look on the left side: the shiny sky-scrapers simbolizing the force of the new empire: the money exchangers. Their uniform is the suit and tie.
None of these two errors of humanity have anything to do with bridges, electric light or hard-drives. Whenever somebody in a suit approaches me, I ask myself if I am in the right place, then I think about what that person does for a living; in most of the cases it does make me puke, as listening to a fat intellectual otherwise in good health does.
Classified in : philosophy, karma Tags : hysteria, capitalism
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About Dr. Naomi Greenblatt
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Sanity is forbidden Circulation: 177,384,936 Issue: 310 | 21st day of Gathering, Y9
The Silent City: Part One
by xialavin
There wasn’t time to think.
The blade missed Etana’s ear by a hairsbreadth. She flattened herself against the wall, stunned – then she thrust outward with her own blade. The Gelert dodged expertly, bringing his sword up to block while twisting away. She sprang after him, arm arching, her sword diving forward to collide with his left shoulder. The Gelert whipped around, eyes and blade set on her heart.
“Quick!” someone shrieked from the shadows.
Instinctively, she dropped to the ground, rolled sideways and swung her leg out, hooking it around his knees.
It looked like it might work. He wobbled for a moment, but then somehow he was steady again, a foot pressed against Etana’s lower back. She struggled to move away, crying out with frustration as she waved her sword in the general direction of his ankle – but all she could do was graze his boot. Then she felt the tip of his blade between her shoulders and she sagged, defeated. That was it. It was over.
Someone grabbed a handful of her golden hair, pulling her face up off the ground. Breath escaped Etana in a hiss, eyes hot with unwelcome tears. She wanted to dash them away but she had to make do with blinking until they slid to the hard stone floor. A round, red face sneered at her, a triumphant gleam in his eyes.
“We always win,” he hissed. “If great warriors can’t beat us, then stinking advisors certainly can’t.”
There was a startled cry and the pressure was released from Etana’s back. Without stopping to question her second chance she leaped to her feet, grabbing the red Shoyru and pressing him against the wall, the blade in her other paw raised...
“Okay, okay!” Luke’s laughing voice called out. “You win! There’s no way I’m getting out of this one.”
Etana lowered her sword and bowed her head with strained politeness to the red Shoyru. Curious, she turned to see Luke, the fire Gelert of the Queen’s Guard, his sword gone and Pedin’s wooden blade slanted down towards him.
She threw her wooden sword back into the pile with relief. It wasn’t real, she reminded herself, but that didn’t matter. She didn’t like swords, no matter what they were made of or intended to do. They were messy and clumsy and they complicated things. She hurried across to the low table, set back into a cluster of neatly trimmed trees in enormous plant pots, and gulped down a goblet of strawberry cordial gratefully. Setting the goblet back on the table she reached, shaky with exertion, for her belt of potions. She felt vulnerable without it, remembering all the times simple potions had saved her from situations where a sword would have been useless.
A bright paw came to rest on her shoulder. She turned quickly, sweat-dampened golden hair whipping her face. Luke grinned down at her, his own fiery ginger curls plastered to his dark-furred forehead.
“I wasn’t ready for a double act,” he confessed, reaching across Etana to take a goblet.
“I thought you were meant to be ready for anything,” she teased back, giving her belt a final tug, feeling suddenly reassured by its weight around her waist.
Luke laughed and shook his head, walking away with the goblet still in his paw. Etana’s gaze roved until she spotted the modest, chocolaty brown Xweetok form of Pedin, half hidden among the crowd. She gave her wings an absentminded flap, stretching them out after keeping them pressed close to her back in combat.
“Advisor Carew?” a small voice piped up. Etana turned. A tiny blue Aisha, dressed in the formal garb of a Thornstonian messenger, peered up at her through slanted eyes. Etana smiled back. “Advisor Carew, her Majesty the Queen asked me to tell you she’s very sorry but she needs your answer now.”
Etana turned her gaze back to Pedin. She already knew her answer; in honesty she’d known it since Alice had first mentioned the task. She also knew Pedin and Brogan wouldn’t like it one iota.
“Yes,” Etana finally said to the waiting messenger. “Tell her Majesty that I accept.”
“And you said yes,” Pedin concluded, flatly.
“I know it might be dangerous,” she said quickly, “but it’s my job! I couldn’t say no.”
“Yes, I know,” he sighed, looking resigned. “But...” he paused, appeared to change his mind, and instead asked: “Have you told Brogan yet?”
“No. He’s meant to be coming to the city for a council meeting tomorrow. I’ll tell him then.”
“And when do you leave?” he asked, concerned. Etana looked at him for a moment before she answered, gazing into his eyes. Pedin was blind, and had been for as long as Etana had known him, but to Etana his caramel eyes served as a pair of strange windows into his thoughts – and right now the dread and trepidation in his eyes felt like arrows to her heart.
“In two days, but I shouldn’t be gone long. Alice showed me a map and it doesn’t look like an especially long journey.”
Etana remembered the map clearly; she’d gazed down at Thornstone, its solid stone city radiating five solid stone towns like a strange, grey sun on the faded map. She’d seen the Thistle River, weaving through the Stone Wood; the wiggly line of the cliffs slowly becoming the wiggly line of a beach the further you followed it away from Thornstone. And there had been a large pinkish shape pressed against the roving beach line. Rosesand, Alice had declared, before pointing out another large shape, this one cutting into a thick patch of trees with a light green hue: Thistleford. Thornstone, Rosesand and Thistleford: known, once upon a time, as the Sister Realms. Etana frowned now as she remembered Alice’s warnings, but she shrugged them off quickly; she couldn’t let Pedin know she was scared. It was important for him to think she could manage this.
“Etana, be careful. Rosesand is... well, Queen Melesse... they say she’s even had her own daughter shut away in the dungeons.”
Etana rested a paw on his lower arm, smiling. “I won’t be alone; Alice has arranged for three of the Queen’s Guard to come with me. Three! I think she’s worried, too. But I can do this.”
Pedin’s mouth curled down at the corners. “I know you can. But I’m meant to look after you; I promised I’d look after you. If anything happened...” He faltered, then sighed. “I just don’t want you to get hurt – so be careful.”
“Actually, I think I should be the one begging you to be careful.” Etana squeezed his arm playfully. “You should hear the list of things Alice needs done while I’m gone – and of course Smith’s playing messenger to Thistleford, so...”
Pedin groaned. “Being an advisor just isn’t what it used to be.”
“Oh, I don’t know.” Etana grinned. “I quite like it.”
Etana watched her brother worriedly for a moment. He didn’t look happy.
“Queen Melesse is unimaginably powerful! She’s been on that throne for so long that no one even remembers who was on the throne before her! And she’s mad – although I’m actually starting to question the sanity of our own queen... you’ve only been doing this job-”
“A year,” Etana cut in. “I’ve been doing this job for a whole year. And that aside, I’m surprised Alice didn’t do this sooner. We’re in a dangerous situation. If Rosesand or Thistleford choose to go against us we’ll be trapped by our own walls. We have to return to the old way, and quickly.”
“The old way...” Brogan snorted. “Good luck getting Melesse to agree to that.” He stared out of the window for a moment, watching a bread cart trundle by. Without looking back at Etana he said, “I’ll come with you. Four guards are better than three.”
“Oh, Brogan,” she said gently, giving him a thin smile, “They’re not just three guards; they’re three highly trained members of the official Queen’s Guard. Pick the smallest, weakest looking one and even he could overpower you with both his paws tied behind his back!”
Brogan looked wary for a moment, then slowly a grin spread across his face. Silence ensued once more, the tall, thin shadow Wocky looking anywhere but at the petite, delicate white Draik. Despite their differences (some more obvious than others), she was his equal, his sole family, his friend; it hurt just to think about life completely without her.
“I’ll be okay,” Etana said seriously, breaking the silence in a slightly uneven voice, suddenly unsure who she was convincing. “I will be okay.”
Brogan grabbed her, hugging her tightly.
“Of course you will. You’ll be fine.”
Her packing was done. Weak sunlight was fighting its way through the persistent pewter clouds, illuminating the glorious city as if to show Etana all she was going to miss. She tried to swallow the feeling down, reminding herself she’d be back soon...
She heaved her case across to the door and reached for the doorknob automatically – then hesitated. Her paw rose, instead, to touch the beautiful teardrop jewel of Thyora’s Tear for a moment, her throat tight and aching. Maybe she really wouldn’t be seeing this place as soon as she’d thought. Alice’s words spun in her head like odd dancers, spinning until all the letters were out of order and all she remembered was the suggestion of danger, a mention of peril.
She gazed around her chamber, at the comfort and luxury she’d grown accustomed to, drinking in all she could. She valued Thornstone beyond all measure; not just the place, but the pets that lived there, too. This place was her home – and she might never see it again.
Week 310 Related Links
Star Power: Part Six
Lena suddenly stopped talking and clasped her paws over her mouth. Ever since she had entered the dressing room, she had been too busy fighting with herself to notice the Usul that had performed earlier...
by springsteen0991
Slorg Slime #5
The little masters of disguise are out yet again to turn your garden into a dangerous place!
by theicyworm
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Weighed and Wanting
by George MacDonald
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Next Part
I. Bad Weather
II. Father, Mother and Son
III. The Magic Lantern
IV. Hester alone
V. Truly the Light is sweet
VI. The Aquarium
VII. Amy Amber
VIII. Cornelius and Vavasor
IX. Songs and Singers
X. Hester and Amy
XI. At Home
XII. A Beginning
XIII. A private Exhibition
XIV. Vavasor and Hester
XV. A small Failure
XVI. The Concert Room
XVII. An uninvited Guest
XVIII. Catastrophe
XIX. Light and Shade
XX. The Journey
XXI. Mother and Daughter
XXII. Gladness
XXIII. Down the Hill
XXIV. Out of the Frying pan
XXV. Was it into the Fire?
XXVI. Waiting a Purpose
XXVII. Major H. G. Marvel
XXVIII. The Major and Vavasor
XXIX. A brave Act
XXX. In another Light
XXXI. The Major and Cousin Helen's Boys
XXXII. A distinguished Guest
XXXIII. Courtship in earnest
XXXIV. Calamity
XXXV. In London
XXXVI. A Talk with the Major
XXXVII. Rencontres
XXXVIII. In the House
XXXIX. The Major and the Small-pox
XL. Down and down
XLI. Difference
XLII. Deep calleth unto Deep
XLIII. Deliverance
XLIV. On the Way up
XLV. More yet
XLVI. Amy and Corney
XLVII. Miss Vavasor
XLVIII. Mr. Christopher
XLIX. An Arrangement
L. Things at Home
LI. The Return
LII. A heavenly Vision
LIII. A sad Beginning
LIV. Mother and Son
LV. Miss Dasomma and Amy
LVI. The sick Room
LVII. Vengeance is Mine
LVIII. Father and Daughter-in-law
LIX. The Message
LX. A birthday Gift
BAD WEATHER.
It was a gray, windy noon in the beginning of autumn. The sky and the sea were almost of the same color, and that not a beautiful one. The edge of the horizon where they met was an edge no more, but a bar thick and blurred, across which from the unseen came troops of waves that broke into white crests, the flying manes of speed, as they rushed at, rather than ran towards the shore: in their eagerness came out once more the old enmity between moist and dry. The trees and the smoke were greatly troubled, the former because they would fain stand still, the latter because it would fain ascend, while the wind kept tossing the former and beating down the latter. Not one of the hundreds of fishing boats belonging to the coast was to be seen; not a sail even was visible; not the smoke of a solitary steamer ploughing its own miserable path through the rain-fog to London or Aberdeen. It was sad weather and depressing to not a few of the thousands come to Burcliff to enjoy a holiday which, whether of days or of weeks, had looked short to the labor weary when first they came, and was growing shorter and shorter, while the days that composed it grew longer and longer by the frightful vitality of dreariness. Especially to those of them who hated work, a day like this, wrapping them in a blanket of fog, whence the water was every now and then squeezed down upon them in the wettest of all rains, seemed a huge bite snatched by that vague enemy against whom the grumbling of the world is continually directed out of the cake that by every right and reason belonged to them. For were they not born to be happy, and how was human being to fulfill his destiny in such circumstances?
There are men and women who can be happy in any—even in such circumstances and worse, but they are rare, and not a little better worth knowing than the common class of mortals—alas that they will be common! content to be common they are not and cannot be. Among these exceptional mortals I do not count such as, having secured the corner of a couch within the radius of a good fire, forget the world around them by help of the magic lantern of a novel that interests them: such may not be in the least worth knowing for their disposition or moral attainment—not even although the noise of the waves on the sands, or the storm in the chimney, or the rain on the windows but serves to deepen the calm of their spirits. Take the novel away, give the fire a black heart; let the smells born in a lodging-house kitchen invade the sitting-room, and the person, man or woman, who can then, on such a day, be patient with a patience pleasant to other people, is, I repeat, one worth knowing—and such there are, though not many. Mrs. Raymount, half the head and more than half the heart of a certain family in a certain lodging house in the forefront of Burcliff, was one of such.
It was not a large family, yet contained perhaps as many varieties of character and temper as some larger ones, with as many several ways of fronting such a misfortune—for that is what poor creatures, the slaves of the elements, count it—as rainy weather in a season concerning which all men agree that it ought to be fine, and that something is out of order, giving ground of complaint, if it be not fine. The father met it with tolerably good humor; but he was so busy writing a paper for one of the monthly reviews, that he would have kept the house had the day been as fine as both the church going visitors, and the mammon-worshipping residents with income depending on the reputation of their weather, would have made it if they could, nor once said by your leave; therefore he had no credit, and his temper must pass as not proven. But if you had taken from the mother her piece of work—she was busy embroidering a lady's pinafore in a design for which she had taken colors and arrangement from a peacock's feather, but was disposing them in the form of a sun which with its rays covered the stomacher, the deeper tints making the shadow between the golden arrows—had you taken from her this piece of work, I say, and given her nothing to do instead, she would yet have looked and been as peaceful as she now looked, for she was not like Doctor Doddridge's dog that did not know who made him.
A longish lad stood in the bow window, leaning his head on the shutter, in a mood of smouldering rebellion against the order of things. He was such a mere creature of moods, that individual judgments of his character might well have proved irreconcilable. He had not yet begun by the use of his will—constantly indeed mistaking impulse for will—to blend the conflicting elements of his nature into one. He was therefore a man much as the mass of flour and raisins, etc., when first put into the bag, is a plum-pudding; and had to pass through something analogous to boiling to give him a chance of becoming worthy of the name he would have arrogated. But in his own estimate of himself he claimed always the virtues of whose presence he was conscious in his good moods letting the bad ones slide, nor taking any account of what was in them. He substituted forgetfulness for repudiation, a return of good humor for repentance, and at best a joke for apology.
Mark, a pale, handsome boy of ten, and Josephine, a rosy girl of seven, sat on the opposite side of the fire, amusing themselves with a puzzle. The gusts of wind, and the great splashes of rain on the glass, only made them feel the cosier and more satisfied.
"Beastly weather!" remarked Cornelius, as with an effort half wriggle, half spring, he raised himself perpendicular, and turned towards the room rather than the persons in it.
"I'm sorry you don't like it, Cornie," said his elder sister, who sat beside her mother trimming what promised to be a pretty bonnet. A concentrated effort to draw her needle through an accumulation of silken folds seemed to take something off the bloom of the smile with which she spoke.
"Oh, it's all very well for girls!" returned Cornelius. "You don't do anything worth doing; and besides you've got so many things you like doing, and so much time to do them in, that it's all one to you whether you go out or stay at home. But when a fellow has but a miserable three weeks and then back to a rot of work he cares no more for than a felon for the treadmill, then it is rather hard to have such a hole made in it! Day after day, as sure as the sun rises—if he does rise—of weather as abominable as rain and wind can make it!"
"My dear boy!" said his mother without looking up.
"Oh, yes, mother! I know! You're so good you would have had Job himself take it coolly. But I'm not like you. Only you needn't think me so very—what you call it! It's only a breach in the laws of nature I'm grumbling at. I don't mean anything to offend you."
"Perhaps you mean more than you think," answered his mother with a deep-drawn breath, which, if not a sigh, was very nearly one. "I should be far more miserable than any weather could make me, not to be able to join in the song of the three holy children."
"I've heard you say that before, mother," said the youth, in a tone that roused his sister's anger; for much that the mother let pass was by the daughter for her sake resented. "But you see," he went on, "the three holy children, as you call them, hadn't much weather of any sort where they sung their song. Precious tired one gets of it before the choir's through with it!"
"They would have been glad enough of some of the weather you call beastly," said Hester, again pulling through a stiff needle, this time without any smile, for sometimes that brother was more than she could bear.
"Oh, I dare say! But then, you see, they knew, when they got out, they wouldn't have to go back to a beastly bank, where notes and gold all day went flying about like bats—nothing but the sight and the figures of it coming their way!"
The mother's face grew very sad as it bent over her work. The youth saw her trouble.
"Mother, don't be vexed with a fellow," he said more gently. "I wasn't made good like you."
"I think you were right about the holy children," she said quietly.
"What!" exclaimed Cornelius. "Mother, I never once before heard you say I was right about any mortal thing! Come, this is pleasant! I begin to think strong ale of myself! I don't understand it, though."
"Shall I tell you? Would you care to know what I mean?"
"Oh, yes, mother! if you want to tell me."
"I think you were right when you implied it was the furnace that made them sing about the world outside of it: one can fancy the idea of the frost and the snow and the ice being particularly pleasant to them. And I am afraid, Cornelius, my dear son, you need the furnace to teach you that the will of God, even in weather, is a thing for rejoicing in, not for abusing. But I dread the fire for your sake, my boy!"
"I should have thought this weather and the bank behind it furnace enough, mother!" he answered, trying to laugh off her words.
"It does not seem to be," she said, with some displeasure. "But then," she added with a sigh, "you have not the same companion that the three holy children had."
"Who was that?" rejoined Cornelius, for he had partly forgotten the story he knew well enough in childhood.
"We will not talk about him now," answered his mother. "He has been knocking at your chamber-door for some time: when he comes to the furnace-door, perhaps you will open that to him."
Cornelius returned no answer; he felt his mother's seriousness awkward, and said to himself she was unkind; why couldn't she make some allowance for a fellow? He meant no harm!
He was still less patient with his mother's not very frequent admonitions, since going into the bank, for, much as he disliked it, he considered himself quite a man of the world in consequence. But he was almost as little capable of slipping like a pebble among other pebbles, the peculiar faculty of the man of the world, as he was of perceiving the kind of thing his mother cared about—and that not from moral lack alone, but from dullness and want of imagination as well. He was like the child so sure he can run alone that he snatches his hand from his mother's and sets off through dirt and puddles, so to act the part of the great personage he would consider himself.
With all her peace of soul, the heart of the mother was very anxious about her son, but she said no more to him now: she knew that the shower bath is not the readiest mode of making a child friendly with cold water.
Just then broke out the sun. The wind had at last blown a hole in the clouds, and through that at once, as is his wont, and the wont of a greater light than the sun, he shone.
"Come! there's something almost like sunshine!" said Cornelius, having for a few moments watched the light on the sands. "Before it goes in again, as it's sure to do in five minutes at the farthest, get on your bonnet, Hester, and let's have an attempt at a walk."
Before Hester could answer came a sudden spatter of rain on the window.
"There! I told you so! That's always the way! Just my luck! For me to set my heart on a thing is all one with being disappointed of it."
"But if the thing was not worth setting your heart on?" said Hester, speaking with forced gentleness.
"What does that signify? The thing is that your heart is set on it. What you think nothing other people may yet be bold enough to take for something."
"Well, at least, if I had to be disappointed, I should like it to be in something that would be worth having."
"Would you now?" returned Cornelius spitefully. "I hope you may have what you want. For my part I don't desire to be better than my neighbor. I think it downright selfish."
"Do you want to be as good as your neighbor, Cornie?" said his mother, looking up through a film of tears. "But there is a more important question than that," she went on, having waited a moment in vain for an answer, "and that is, whether you are content with being as good as yourself, or want to be better."
"To tell you the truth, mother, I don't trouble my head about such things. Philosophers are agreed that self consciousness is the bane of the present age: I mean to avoid it. If you had let me go into the army, I might have had some leisure for what you call thought, but that horrible bank takes everything out of a fellow. The only thing it leaves is a burning desire to forget it at any cost till the time comes when you must endure it again. If I hadn't some amusement in between, I should cut my throat, or take to opium or brandy. I wonder how the governor would like to be in my place!"
Hester rose and left the room, indignant with him for speaking so of his father.
"If your father were in your place, Cornelius," said his mother with dignity, "he would perform the duties of it without grumbling, however irksome they might be."
"How do you know that, mother? He was never tried."
"I know it because I know him," she answered.
Cornelius gave a grunt.
"If you think it hard," his mother resumed, "that you have to follow a way of life not of your own choosing, you must remember that you never could be got to express a preference for one way over another, and that your father had to strain every nerve to send you to college—to the disadvantage, for a time at least, of others of the family. I am sorry to have to remind you also that you did not make it any easier for him by your mode of living while there."
"I didn't run up a single bill!" cried Cornelius with indignation; "and my father knows it!"
"He does; but he knows also that your cousin Robert did not spend above two-thirds of what you did, and made more of his time too."
"He was in rather a different set," sneered the youth.
"And you know," his mother went on, "that his main design in placing you in your uncle's bank was that you might gain such a knowledge of business as will be necessary to the proper management of the money he will leave behind him. When you have gained that knowledge, there will be time to look farther, for you are young yet."
Now his father's money was the continuous occasion of annoyance to Cornelius, for it was no secret from his family how he meant to dispose of it. He intended, namely, to leave it under trustees, of whom he wished his son to be one until he married, when it was to be divided equally among his children.
This arrangement was not agreeable to Cornelius, who could not see, he said, what advantage in that case he had from being the eldest of the family.
He broke out in a tone of expostulation, ready to swell into indignant complaint.
"Now, mother," he said "do you think it fair that I should have to look after the whole family as if they were my own?"
This was by no means his real cause of complaint, but he chose to use it as his grievance for the present.
"You will have the other trustees to advise with," said his mother. "It need not weigh on you very heavily."
"Well, of course, I could do better with it than anybody out of the family."
"If you have your father's love of fair play, Cornelius, you will. What you can do to that end now is to make yourself thoroughly acquainted with business."
"A bank's not the place to get the knowledge of business necessary for that sort of thing."
"Your father has reasons for preferring a general to any special knowledge. The fitness resulting will depend upon yourself. And when you marry you will, as you know, be rid of the responsibility. So far your father and you are of one mind; he does not think it fair that a married man should be burdened with any family but his own."
"What if I should marry before my father's death?"
"I hope, indeed, you will, Cornelius. The arrangements your father has made is one of provision against the unlikely. When you are married, I don't doubt he will make another, to meet the new circumstances."
"Now," said Cornelius to himself, "I do believe if I was to marry money—as why shouldn't I?—my father would divide my share amongst the rest, and not give me a farthing!"
Full of the injury of the idea, he rose and left the room. His mother, poor woman, wept as he vanished. She dared not allow herself to ask why she wept—dared not allow to herself that her first-born was not a lovely thought to her—dared not ask where he could have got such a mean nature—so mean that he did not know he was mean.
Although the ill-humor in which he had been ever since he came was by himself attributed to the weather, and had been expended on the cooking, on the couches, on the beds, and twenty different things that displeased him, he had nevertheless brought it with him; and her experience gave her the sad doubt that the cause of it might lie in his own conduct—for the consciousness may be rendered uneasy without much rousing of the conscience proper.
He had always been fitful and wayward, but had never before behaved so unpleasantly. Certainly his world had not improved him for his home. Yet amongst his companions he bore the character of the best-natured fellow in the world. To them he never showed any of the peevishness arising from mental discomfort, but kept it for those who loved him a thousand times better, and would have cheerfully parted with their own happiness for his. He was but one of a large herd of youths, possessing no will of their own, yet enjoying the reputation of a strong one; for moved by liking or any foolish notion, his pettiness made a principle of, he would be obstinate; and the common philosophy always takes obstinacy for strength of will, even when it springs from utter inability to will against liking.
Mr. Raymount knew little of the real nature of his son. The youth was afraid of his father—none the less that he spoke of him with so little respect. Before him he dared not show his true nature. He knew and dreaded the scorn which the least disclosure of his feeling about the intended division of his father's money would rouse in him. He knew also that his mother would not betray him—he would have counted it betrayal—to his father; nor would any one who had ever heard Mr. Raymount give vent to his judgment of any conduct he despised, have wondered at the reticence of either of them.
Whether in his youth he would have done as well in a position like his son's as his worshipping wife believed, may be doubtful; but that he would have done better than his son must seem more than probable.
FATHER, MOTHER, AND SON.
Gerald Raymount was a man of an unusual combination of qualities. There were such contradictions in his character as to give ground for the suspicion, in which he certainly himself indulged, that there must be in him at least one strain not far removed from the savage, while on the other hand there were mental conditions apparently presupposing ages of culture. At the university he had indulged in large reading outside the hedge of his required studies, and gained thus an acquaintance with and developed a faculty in literature destined to stand him in good stead.
Inheriting earthly life and a history—nothing more—from a long line of ancestors, and a few thousand pounds—less than twenty—from his father, who was a country attorney, a gentle, quarrelsome man, who yet never, except upon absolute necessity, carried a case into court, he had found, as his family increased, that his income was not sufficient for their maintenance in accustomed ease. With not one expensive personal taste between them, they had neither of them the faculty for saving money—often but another phrase for doing mean things. Neither husband nor wife was capable of screwing. Had the latter been, certainly the free-handedness of the former would have driven her to it; but while Mrs. Raymount would go without a new bonnet till an outcry arose in the family that its respectability was in danger, she could not offer two shillings a day to a sempstress who thought herself worth half-a-crown; she could not allow a dish to be set on her table which was not as likely to encourage hunger as allay it; neither because some richer neighbors gave so little, would she take to herself the spiritual fare provided in church without making a liberal acknowledgment in carnal things. The result of this way of life was the deplorable one that Mr. Raymount was compelled to rouse himself, and, from the chair of a somewhat self-indulgent reader of many books, betake himself to his study-table, to prove whether it were not possible for him to become the writer of such as might add to an income showing scantier every quarter. Here we may see the natural punishment of liberal habits; for this man indulging in them, and, instead of checking them in his wife, loving her the more that she indulged in them also, was for this reason condemned to labor—the worst evil of life in the judgment of both the man about Mayfair and the tramp of the casual ward. But there are others who dare not count that labor an evil which helps to bring out the best elements of human nature, not even when the necessity for it outlasts any impulse towards it, and who remember the words of the Lord: "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work."
For Gerald Raymount, it made a man of him—which he is not who is of no service to his generation. Doubtless he was driven thereto by necessity; but the question is not whether a man works upon more or less compulsion, but whether the work he is thus taught to do he makes good honest work for which the world is so much the better. In this matter of work there are many first that shall be last. The work of a baker for instance must stand higher in the judgment of the universe than that of a brewer, let his ale be ever so good. Because the one trade brings more money than the other the judgment of this world counts it more honorable, but there is the other judgment at hand.
In the exercise of his calling Raymount was compelled to think more carefully than before, and thus not only his mind took a fresh start, but his moral and spiritual nature as well. He slid more and more into writing out the necessities and experiences of his own heart and history, and so by degrees gained power of the only true kind—that, namely, of rousing the will, not merely the passions, or even the aspirations of men. The poetry in which he had disported himself at college now came to the service of his prose, and the deeper poetic nature, which is the prophetic in every man, awoke in him. Till after they had lived together a good many years the wife did not know the worth of the man she had married, nor indeed was he half the worth when she married him that he had now grown to be. The longer they lived the prouder she grew of him and of his work; nor was she the less the practical wisdom of the house that she looked upon her husband as a great man. He was not a great man—only a growing man; yet was she nothing the worse for thinking so highly of him; the object of it was not such that her admiration caused her to deteriorate.
The daughter of a London barrister, of what is called a good family, she had opportunity of knowing something of what is called life before she married, and from mere dissatisfaction had early begun to withdraw from the show and self-assertion of social life, and seek within herself the door of that quiet chamber whose existence is unknown to most. For a time she found thus a measure of quiet—not worthy of the name of rest; she had not heeded a certain low knocking as of one who would enter and share it with her; but now for a long time he who thus knocked had been her companion in the chamber whose walls are the infinite. Why is it that men and women will welcome any tale of love, devotion, and sacrifice from one to another of themselves, but turn from the least hint at the existence of a perfect love at the root of it all? With such a message to them, a man is a maundering prophet. Is it not that their natures are yet so far from the ideal, the natural, the true, that the words of the prophet rouse in them no vision, no poorest perception of spiritual fact?
Helen Raymount was now a little woman of fifty, clothed in a sweet dignity, from which the contrast she disliked between her plentiful gray hair, and her great, clear, dark eyes, took nothing; it was an opposition without discord. She had but the two daughters and two sons already introduced, of whom Hester was the eldest.
Wise as was the mother, and far-seeing as was the father, they had made the mistake common to all but the wisest parents, of putting off to a period more or less too late the moment of beginning to teach their children obedience. If this be not commenced at the first possible moment, there is no better reason why it should be begun at any other, except that it will be the harder every hour it is postponed. The spiritual loss and injury caused to the child by their waiting till they fancy him fit to reason with, is immense; yet there is nothing in which parents are more stupid and cowardly, if not stiff-necked, than this. I do not speak of those mere animal parents, whose lasting influence over their progeny is not a thing to be greatly desired, but of those who, having a conscience, yet avoid this part of their duty in a manner of which a good motherly cat would be ashamed. To one who has learned of all things to desire deliverance from himself, a nursery in which the children are humored and scolded and punished instead of being taught obedience, looks like a moral slaughter-house.
The dawn of reason will doubtless help to develop obedience; but obedience is yet more necessary to the development of reason. To require of a child only what he can understand the reason of, is simply to help him to make himself his own God—that is a devil. That some seem so little injured by their bad training is no argument in presence of the many in whom one can read as in a book the consequences of their parents' foolishness.
Cornelius was a youth of good abilities, and with a few good qualities. Naturally kind-hearted, yet full of self and its poor importance, he had an admiration of certain easy and showy virtues. He was himself not incapable of an unthinking generosity; felt pity for picturesque suffering; was tempted to kindness by the prospect of a responsive devotion. Unable to bear the sight of suffering, he was yet careless of causing it where he would not see it; incapable of thwarting himself, he was full of weak indignation at being thwarted; supremely conceited, he had yet a regard for the habits and judgments of men of a certain stamp which towards a great man would have been veneration, and would have elevated his being. But the sole essentials of life as yet discovered by Cornelius were a good carriage, good manners, self-confidence, and seeming carelessness in spending. That the spender was greedy after the money he yet scorned to work for, made no important difference in Cornelius's estimate of him. In a word, he fashioned a fine gentleman-god in his foolish brain, and then fell down and worshipped him with what worship was possible between them. To all home-excellence he was so far blind that he looked down upon it; the opinion of father or mother, though they had reared such a son as himself, was not to be compared in authority with that of Reginald Vavasor, who, though so poor as to be one of his fellow-clerks, was heir apparent to an earldom.
THE MAGIC LANTERN.
Cornelius, leaving his mother, took refuge with his anger in his own room. Although he had occupied it but a fortnight the top of its chest of drawers was covered with yellow novels—the sole kind of literature for which Cornelius cared. Of this he read largely, if indeed his mode of swallowing could be called reading; his father would have got more pleasure out of the poorest of them than Cornelius could from a dozen. And now in this day's dreariness, he had not one left unread, and was too lazy or effeminate or prudent to encounter the wind and rain that beset the path betwixt him and the nearest bookshop. None of his father's books had any attraction for him. Neither science, philosophy, history, nor poetry held for him any interest. A drearier soul in a drearier setting could hardly be imagined than the soul of this youth in that day's weather at Burcliff.
Does a reader remark, "Well, wherein was the poor fellow to blame? No man can make himself like this or like that! The thing that is a passion to one is a bore to another! Some with both ear and voice have no love for music. Most exquisite of sonatas would not to them make up for a game of billiards! They cannot help it: they are made so"?—I answer, It is true no one can by an effort of the will care for this or that; but where a man cares for nothing that is worth caring for, the fault must lie, not in the nature God made, but in the character the man himself has made and is making. There is a moral reason why he does not and cannot care. If Cornelius had begun at any time, without other compulsion than the urging within him, to do something he knew he ought to do, he would not now have been the poor slave of circumstances he was—at the call and beck of the weather—such, in fact, as the weather willed. When men face a duty, not merely will that duty become at once less unpleasant to them, but life itself will immediately begin to gather interest; for in duty, and in duty only, does the individual begin to come into real contact with life; therein only can he see what life is, and grow fit for it.
He threw himself on his bed—for he dared not smoke where his father was—and dozed away the hours till lunch, then returned and dozed again, with more success, till tea time. This was his only resource against the unpleasantness of the day. The others were nowise particularly weighed down by it, and the less that Cornelius was so little in the room, haunting the window with his hands in his pockets.
When tea was over, he rose and sauntered once more to the window, the only outlook he ever frequented.
"Hullo!" he cried, turning from it quickly. "I say, Hester! here's a lark! the sun's shining as if his grandmother had but just taught him how! The rain's over, I declare—at least for a quarter of an hour! Come, let's have a walk. We'll go and hear the band in the castle-gardens. I don't think there's any thing going on at the theatre, else I would take you there."
The sight of the sun revives both men and midges.
"I would rather walk," said Hester. "It is seldom one sees good acting in the provinces. At best there is but one star. I prefer a jewel to a gem, and a decent play to a fine part."
"Hester," said Cornelius with reproof, "I believe you think it a fine thing to be hard to please! I know a fellow that calls it a kind of suicide. To allow a spot to spoil your pleasure in a beauty is to be too fond of perfection."
"No, Corney," answered his sister, "that is hardly my position. What I would say is rather, that one point of excellence is not enough to make a whole beautiful—a face, or a play—or a character."
Hester had a rather severe mode of speaking, especially to this brother, which, if it had an end, failed of it. She was the only person in the house who could ever have done any thing with him, and she lost her advantage—let me use a figure—by shouting to him from a distance, instead of coming close up to him and speaking in a whisper. But for that she did not love him enough, neither was she yet calm enough in herself to be able for it. I doubt much, however, if he would have been in any degree permanently the better for the best she could have done for him. He was too self-satisfied for any redemption. He was afraid of his father, resented the interference of his mother, was as cross as he pleased with his sister, and cared little whether she was vexed with him or not. And he regarded the opinion of any girl, just because she was a girl, too little to imagine any reflection on himself in the remark she had just made.
While they talked he had been watching the clouds.
"Do go, Hester," he said. "I give you my word it will be a fine evening."
She went to put on her hat and cloak, and presently they were in the street.
It was one of those misty clearings in which sometimes the day seems to gather up his careless skirts, that have been sweeping the patient, half-drowned world, as he draws nigh the threshold of the waiting night. There was a great lump of orange color half melted up in the watery clouds of the west, but all was dreary and scarce consolable, up to the clear spaces above, stung with the steely stars that began to peep out of the blue hope of heaven. Thither Hester kept casting up her eyes as they walked, or rather somehow her eyes kept travelling thitherward of themselves, as if indeed they had to do with things up there. And the child that cries for the moon is wiser than the man who looks upon the heavens as a mere accident of the earth, with which none but unpractical men concern themselves.
But as she walked gazing at "an azure disc, shield of tranquility," over her head, she set her foot down unevenly, and gave her ankle a wrench. She could not help uttering a little cry.
"There now, Hester!" said Cornelius, pulling her up like a horse that stumbled, "that's what you get by your star-gazing! You are always coming to grief by looking higher than your head!"
"Oh, please, stop a minute, Corney," returned Hester, for the fellow would have walked on as if nothing had happened. "My ankle hurts so!"
"I didn't know it was so bad as that!" he answered stopping. "There! take my arm."
"Now I can go on again," she said, after a few moments of silent endurance. "How stupid of me!—on a plain asphalt pavement!"
He might have excused her with the remark that just on such was an accidental inequality the more dangerous.
"What bright, particular star were you worshipping now?" he asked scoffingly.
"What do you mean by that?" she rejoined in a tone affected by her suffering, which thence, from his lack of sympathy, he took for one of crossness.
"You know quite well," he answered roughly, "that you are always worshipping some paragon or other—for a while, till you get tired of her, and then throw her away for another!"
Hester was hurt and made no answer.
There was some apparent ground for the accusation. She was ready to think extravagantly of any new acquaintances that pleased her. Frank and true and generous, it was but natural she should read others by herself; just as those in whom is meanness or guile cannot help attributing the same to the simplest. Nor was the result unnatural either, namely, that, when a brief intercourse had sufficed to reveal a nature on the common level, it sufficed also to chill the feeling that had rushed to the surface to welcome a friend, and send the new-found floating far away on the swift ebb of disappointment. Any whom she treats thus, called her, of course, fitful and changeable, whereas it was in truth the unchangeableness of her ideal and her faithfulness to it that exposed her to blame. She was so true, so much in earnest, and, although gentle, had so little softness to drape the sterner outlines of her character that she was looked upon with dislike by not a few of her acquaintance.
"That again comes of looking too high, and judging with precipitation," resumed Cornelius, urged from within to be unpleasant—and the rather that she did not reply.
He was always ready to criticise, and it was so much the easier for him that he had not the least bent towards self-criticism. For the latter supposes some degree of truth in the inward parts, and that is obstructive to the indulgence of the former tendency. As to himself, he would be hand and glove at a moment's notice with any man who looked a gentleman, and made himself agreeable; nor whatever he might find him to be, was he, so long as the man was not looked down upon by others, the least inclined to avoid his company because of moral shadiness. "A man can take care of himself!" he would say.
Hester stopped again.
"Corney," she said, "my ankle feels so weak! I am walking in terror of twisting it again. You must let me stand a bit. I shall be all right in a minute."
"I'm very sorry," rejoined her brother disagreeably. "We must take the first fly we meet, and go home again. It's just my luck! I thought we were going to have some fun!"
They stood silent, she looking nowhere, and he staring now in this direction, now in that. "Hullo! what's this?" he cried, his gaze fixing on a large building opposite. "The Pilgrim's Progress! The Rake's Progress! Ha! ha! As edifying as amusing, no doubt! I suppose the Pilgrim and the Rake are contrasted with each other. But how, I wonder! Is it a lecture or a magic lantern? Both, I dare say! Let's go in and see! I can't read any more of the bill. We may at least sit there till your ankle is better. 'Admission—front seats sixpence.' Come along. We may get a good laugh, who knows?—a thing cheap at any price—for our sixpence!"
"I don't mind," said Hester, and they crossed the road.
It was a large, dingy, dirty, water-stained and somewhat dilapidated hall to which the stone stair, ascending immediately from the door, led them; and it would have looked considerably worse but for the obscurity belonging to the nature of the entertainment, through which it took some pains to discover the twenty-five or thirty people that formed the company present. It was indeed a dim, but not therefore, a very religious light that pervaded rather than overcame the gloom, issuing chiefly from the crude and discordant colors of a luminous picture on a great screen at the farther end of the hall. There an ill-proportioned figure, presenting, although his burden was of course gone some time, a still very humpy Christian, was shown extended on the ground, with his sword a yard beyond his reach, and Apollyon straddling across the whole breadth of the way, and taking him in the stride. But that huge stride was the fiend's sole expression of vigor; for, although he held a flaming dart ready to strike the poor man dead, his own dragon countenance was so feebly demoniacal that it seemed unlikely he would have the heart to drive it home. The lantern from which proceeded the picture, was managed by a hidden operator, evidently from his voice, occasionally overheard, a mere boy; and an old man, like a broken-down clergyman, whose dirty white neckcloth seemed adjusted on a secret understanding of moral obliquity, its knot suggesting a gradual approach to the last position a knot on the neck can assume, kept walking up and down the parti-colored gloom, flaunting a pretense of lecture on the scenes presented. Whether he was a little drunk or greatly in his dotage, it was impossible to determine without a nearer acquaintance. If I venture to give a specimen of his mode of lecturing, it will be seen that a few lingering rags of scholastic acquirement, yet fluttered about the poor fellow.
"Here you behold the terrible battle between Christian—or was it Faithful?—I used to know, but trouble has played old Hookey with my memory. It's all here, you know"—and he tapped the bald table-land of his head—"but somehow it ain't handy as it used! In the morning it flourisheth and groweth up: in the evening it is cut down and withereth. Man that is in honor and abideth not, is like the beast that perisheth—but there's Christian and Apollyon, right afore you, and better him than me. When I was a young one, and that wasn't yesterday, I used to think, but that was before I could read, that Apollyon was one and the same with Bonaparty—Nappoleon, you know. And I wasn't just so far wrong neither, as I shall readily prove to those of my distinguished audience who have been to college like myself, and learned to read Greek like their mother tongue. For what is the very name Apollyon, but an occult prophecy concerning the great conqueror of Europe! nothing can be plainer! Of course the first letter, N, stands for nothing—a mere veil to cover the prophecy till the time of revealing. In all languages it is the sign of negation—no, and none, and never, and nothing; therefore cast it away as the nothing it is. Then what have you left but apoleon! Throw away another letter, and what have you but poleon! Throw away letter after letter, and what do you get but words—Napoleon, apoleon, poleon, oleon, leon, eon, or, if you like, on! Now these are all Greek words—and what, pray, do they mean? I will give you a literal translation, and I challenge any Greek scholar who may be here present to set me right, that is, to show me wrong: Napoleon the destroyer of cities, being a destroying lion! Now I should like to know a more sure word of prophecy than that! Would any one in the company oblige me? I take that now for an incontrovertible"—he stammered over this word—"proof of the truth of the Bible. But I am wandering from my subject, which error, I pray you, ladies and gentlemen, to excuse, for I am no longer what I was in the prime of youth's rosy morn—come, I must get on! Change the slide, boy; I'm sick of it. I'm sick of it all. I want to get home and go to bed."
He maundered on in this way, uttering even worse nonsense than I have set down, and mingling with it soiled and dusty commonplaces of religion, every now and then dwelling for a moment or two upon his own mental and physical declension from the admirable being he once was. He reached the height of his absurdity in describing the resistance of the two pilgrims to the manifold temptations of Vanity Fair, which he so set forth as to take from Christian and Faithful the smallest possible appearance of merit in turning their backs upon them.
Cornelius was in fits of laughter, which he scarcely tried to choke. When the dreary old soul drew near where he sat, smelling abominably of strong drink, the only thing that kept his merriment within bounds was the dread that the man might address him personally, and so draw upon him the attention of the audience.
Very different was the mood of Hester. To the astonishment of Cornelius, when at last they rose to go, there were tears in her eyes. The misery of the whole thing was too dreadful to her! The lantern itself must, she thought, have been made when the invention was in its infancy, and its pictured slides seemed the remnants of various outworn series. Those of the Rake's Progress were something too hideous and lamentable to be dwelt upon. And the ruinous, wretched old man did not merely seem to have taken to this as a last effort, but to have in his dotage turned back upon his life course, and resumed a half-forgotten trade—or perhaps only an accomplishment of which he had made use for the benefit of his people when he was a clergyman—to find that the faculty for it he once had, and on which he had reckoned to carry him through, had abandoned him. Worst of all to the heart of Hester was the fact that so few people were present, many of them children at half-price, some of whom seemed far from satisfied with the amusement offered them. When the hall and the gas—but that would not be much—and the advertising were paid for, what would the poor old scrag-end of humanity, with his yellow-white neckcloth knotted hard under his left ear, have over for his supper? Was there any woman to look after him? and would she give him anything fit to eat? Hester was all but crying to think she could do nothing for him—that he was so far from her and beyond her help, when she remembered the fat woman with curls hanging down her cheeks, who had taken their money at the door. Apparently she was his wife—and seemed to thrive upon it! But alas for the misery of the whole thing!
When they came out and breathed again the blue, clean, rain-washed air instead of the musty smells of the hall, involuntarily Hester's eyes rose to the vault whose only keystone is the will of the Father, whose endless space alone is large enough to picture the heart of God: how was that old man to get up into the high regions and grow clean and wise? For all the look, he must belong there as well as she! And were there not thousands equally and more miserable in the world—people wrapped in no tenderness, to whom none ministered, left if not driven—so it seemed at the moment to Hester—to fold themselves in their own selfishness? And was there nothing she, a favored one of the family, could do to help, to comfort, to lift up one such of her own flesh and blood?—to rescue a heart from the misery of hopelessness?—to make this one or that feel there was a heart of love and refuge at the centre of things? Hester had a large, though not hitherto entirely active aspiration in her; and now, the moment she began to flutter her weak wings, she found the whole human family hanging upon her, and that she could not rise except in raising them along with her. For the necessities of our deepest nature are such as not to admit of a mere private individual satisfaction. I well remember feeling as a child that I did not care for God to love me if he did not love everybody: the kind of love I needed was love essential to my nature—the love of me, a man, not of me a person—the love therefore that all men needed, the love that belonged to their nature as the children of the Father, a love he could not give me except he gave it to all men.
But this was not the beginning of Hester's enthusiasm for her kind—only a crystallizing shock it received.
Nor was it likely to be the less powerful in the end that now at the age of three and twenty she had but little to show for it. She was one of the strong ones that grow slowly; and she had now for some years been cherishing an idea, and working for its realization, which every sight and sound of misery tended to quicken and strengthen.
"There you are again," said Cornelius—"star-gazing as usual! You'll be spraining your other ankle presently!"
"I had forgotten all about my ankle, Corney dear," returned Hester, softened by her sorrowful sympathy; "but I will be careful."
"You had better. Well, I think between us we had the worth of our shilling! Did you ever see such a ridiculous old bloke!"
"I wish you would not use that word, Corney," said Hester, letting her displeasure fall on the word, where she knew the feeling was entrenched beyond assault.
"What's the matter with the word? It is the most respectable old Anglo-Saxon."
Hester said no more, but heaved an inward sigh. Of what consequence were the words her brother used, so long as he recognized no dignity in life, never set himself to be! Why should any one be taught to behave like a gentleman, so long as he is no gentleman?
Cornelius burst out laughing.
"To think of those muffs going through the river—sliding along the bottom, and spreading out their feelers above the water, like two rearing lobsters! And the angels waiting for them on the bank like laundresses with their clean shirts! Ha! ha! ha!"
"They seemed to me," answered Hester, "very much like the men, and angels too, in that old edition of the Pilgrim papa thinks so much of. I couldn't for my part, absurd as they were, help feeling a certain pathos in the figures and faces."
"That came of the fine interpretation the old—hm!—codger gave of their actions and movements!"
"It may have come of the pitiful feeling the whole affair gave me—I cannot tell," said Hester. "That old man made me very sad."
"Now you do strand me, Hester!" replied her brother. "How you could see anything pathetic, or pitiful as you call it, in that disreputable old humbug, I can't even imagine. A more ludicrous specimen of tumble-down humanity it would be impossible to find! A drunken old thief—I'll lay you any thing! Catch me leaving a sov where he could spy the shine of it!"
"And don't you count that pitiful, Cornelius? Can you see one of your own kind, with heart and head and hands like your own, so self-abandoned, so low, so hopeless, and feel no pity for him? Didn't you hear him say to himself as he passed you, 'Come, let's get on! I'm sick of it. I don't know what I'm talking about.' He seemed actually to despise himself!"
"What better or more just could he do? But never you mind: he's all right! Don't you trouble your head about him. You should see him when he gets home! He'll have his hot supper and his hot tumbler, don't you fear! Swear he will too, and fluently, if it's not waiting him!"
"Now that seems to me the most pitiful of all," returned Hester, and was on the point of adding, "That is just the kind of pity I feel for you, Corney," but checked herself. "Is it not most pitiful to see a human being, made in the image of God, sunk so low?" she said.
"It's his own doing," returned Cornelius.
"And is not that yet the lowest and worst of it all? If he could not help it, and therefore was not to blame, it would be sad enough; but to be such, and be to blame for being such, seems to me misery upon misery unbearable."
"There I don't agree with you—not at all! So long as a fellow has fair play, and nothing happens to him but what he brings upon himself, I don't see what he has to complain of."
"But that is not the question," interrupted Hester. "It is not whether he has anything to complain of, but whether he has anything to be pitied for. I don't know what I wouldn't do to make that old man clean and comfortable!"
Cornelius again burst into a great laugh. No man was anything to him merely because he was a man.
"A highly interesting protege you would have!" he said; "and no doubt your friends would congratulate you when you presented him! But for my part I don't see the least occasion to trouble your head about such riffraff. Every manufacture has its waste, and he's human waste. There's misery enough in the world without looking out for it, and taking other people's upon our shoulders. You remember what one of the fellows in the magic lantern said: 'Every tub must stand on its own bottom'!"
Hester held her peace. That her own brother's one mode of relieving the suffering in the world should be to avoid as much as possible adding to his own, was to her sisterly heart humiliating.
HESTER ALONE.
When the family separated for the night and Hester reached her room, she sat down and fell a thinking, not more earnestly but more continuously.
She was one of those women—not few in number, I have good reason to think, though doubtless few comparatively, who from the first dawn of consciousness have all their lives endeavored, with varying success, with frequent failure of strength, and occasional brief collapse of effort, to do the right thing. Therein she had but followed in the footsteps of her mother, who, though not so cultivated as she, walked no less steady in the true path of humanity. But the very earnestness of Hester's endeavor along with the small reason she found for considering it successful; the frequent irritation with herself because of failure; and the impossibility of satisfying the hard master Self, who, while he flatters some, requires of others more than they can give—all tended to make her less evenly sympathetic with those about her than her heart's theory demanded. Willing to lay down her life for them, a matchless nurse in sickness, and in trouble revealing a tenderness perfectly lovely, she was yet not the one to whom first either of the children was ready to flee with hurt or sorrow: she was not yet all human, because she was not yet at home with the divine.
Thousands that are capable of great sacrifices are yet not capable of the little ones which are all that are required of them. God seems to take pleasure in working by degrees; the progress of the truth is as the permeation of leaven, or the growth of a seed: a multitude of successive small sacrifices may work more good in the world than many a large one. What would even our Lord's death on the cross have been, except as the crown of a life in which he died daily, giving himself, soul, body and spirit, to his men and women? It is the Being that is the precious thing. Being is the mother to all little Doings as well as the grown-up Deeds and the mighty heroic Sacrifice; and these little Doings, like the good children of the house, make the bliss of it. Hester had not had time, neither had she prayed enough to be quite yet, though she was growing well towards it. She was a good way up the hill, and the Lord was coming down to meet her, but they had not quite met yet, so as to go up the rest of the way together.
In religious politics, Hester was what is called a good churchwoman, which in truth means a good deal of a sectarian. She not merely recoiled from such as venerated the more primitive modes of church-government rather than those of later expediency, and preferred far inferior extempore prayers to the best possible prayers in print, going therefore to some chapel instead of the church, but she looked down upon them as from a superior social standing—that is, with the judgment of this world, and not that of Christ the carpenter's son. In short, she had a repugnance to the whole race of dissenters, and would not have soiled her dress with the dust of one of their school-rooms even. She regarded her own conscience as her Lord, but had not therefore any respect for that of another man where it differed from her in the direction of what she counted vulgarity. So she was scarcely in the kingdom of heaven yet, any more than thousands who regard themselves as choice Christians. I do not say these feelings were very active in her, for little occurred to call them out; but she did not love her dissenting neighbor, and felt good and condescending when, brought into contact with one, she behaved kindly to him.
I well know that some of my readers will heartily approve of her in this very thing, and that not a few good dissenters on the other hand, who are equally and in precisely the same way sectarians, that is bad Christians, will scorn her for it; but for my part I would rather cut off my right hand than be so cased and stayed in a narrow garment of pride and satisfaction, condemned to keep company with myself instead of the Master as he goes everywhere—into the poorest companies of them that love each other, and so invite his presence.
The Lord of truth and beauty has died for us: shall we who, by haunting what we call his courts, have had our sense of beauty, our joy in grace tenfold exalted, gather around us, in the presence of those we count less refined than ourselves, skirts trimmed with the phylacteries of the world's law, turning up the Pharisaical nose, and forgetting both what painful facts self-criticism has revealed to ourselves, and the eyes upon us of the yet more delicate refinement and the yet gentle breeding of the high countries? May these not see in us some malgrace which it needs the gentleness of Christ to get over and forget, some savagery of which we are not aware, some gaucherie that repels though it cannot estrange them? Casting from us our own faults first, let us cast from us and from him our neighbor's also. O gentle man, the common man is yet thy brother, and thy gentleness should make him great, infecting him with thy humility, not rousing in him the echo of a vile unheavenly scorn. Wilt thou, with thy lofty condescension, more intrinsically vulgar than even his ugly self-assertion, give him cause too good to hate thy refinement? It is not thy refinement makes thee despise him; it is thy own vulgarity; and if we dare not search ourselves close enough to discover the low breeding, the bad blood in us, it will one day come out plain as the smitten brand of the forcat.
That Hester had a tendency to high church had little or nothing to do with the matter. Such exclusiveness is simply a form of that pride, justify or explain it as you will, which found its fullest embodiment in the Jewish Pharisee—the evil thing that Christ came to burn up with his lovely fire, and which yet so many of us who call ourselves by his name keep hugging to our bosoms—I mean the pride that says, "I am better than thou." If these or those be in any true sense below us, it is of Satan to despise—of Christ to stoop and lay hold of and lift the sister soul up nearer to the heart of the divine tenderness.
But this tenderness, which has its roots in every human heart, had larger roots in the heart of Hester than in most. Whatever her failings, whatever ugly weeds grew in the neglected corners of her nature, the moment she came in contact with any of her kind in whatever condition of sadness or need, the pent-up love of God—I mean the love that came of God and was divine in her—would burst its barriers and rush forth, sometimes almost overwhelming herself in its torrent. She would then be ready to die, nothing less, to help the poor and miserable. She was not yet far enough advanced to pity vulgarity in itself—perhaps none but Christ is able to do that—but she could and did pity greatly its associated want and misery, nor was repelled from them by their accompanying degradation.
The tide of action, in these later years flowing more swiftly in the hearts of women—whence has resulted so much that is noble, so much that is paltry, according to the nature of the heart in which it swells—had been rising in that of Hester also. She must not waste her life! She must do something! What should it be? Her deep sense of the misery around her had of course suggested that it must be something in the way of help. But what form was the help to take? "I have no money!" she said to herself—for this the last and feeblest of means for the doing of good is always the first to suggest itself to one who has not perceived the mind of God in the matter. To me it seems that the first thing in regard to money is to prevent it from doing harm. The man who sets out to do good with his fortune is like one who would drive a team of tigers through the streets of a city, or hunt the fox with cheetahs. I would think of money as Christ thought of it, not otherwise; for no other way is true, however it may recommend itself to good men; and neither Christ nor his apostles did anything by means of money; nay, he who would join them in their labors had to abandon his fortune.
This evening, then, the thought of the vulgar, miserable, ruinous old man, with his wretched magic lantern, kept haunting Hester, and made her very pitiful; and naturally, starting from him, her thoughts went wandering abroad over the universe of misery. For was not the world full of men and women who groaned, not merely under poverty and cruelty, weakness and sickness, but under dullness and stupidity, hugged in the paralyzing arms of that devil-fish, The Commonplace, or held fast to the rocks by the crab Custom, while the tide of moral indifference was fast rising to choke them? Was there no prophet, no redemption, no mediator for such as these? Were there not thousands of women, born with a trembling impulse towards the true and lovely, in whom it was withering for lack of nurture, and they themselves continuously massing into common clay, a summer-fall of human flowers off the branches of hope and aspiration? How many young wives, especially linked to the husbands of their choice, and by this very means disenchanted, as they themselves would call it, were doomed to look no more upon life as the antechamber of the infinite, but as the counting-house of the king of the nursery-ballad, where you may, if you can, eat bread and honey, but where you must count your money! At the windows of the husband-house no more looks out the lover but the man of business, who takes his life to consist in the abundance of the things he possesses! He must make money for his children!—and would make money if he had nor chick nor child. Could she do nothing for such wives at least? The man who by honest means made people laugh, sent a fire-headed arrow into the ranks of the beleaguering enemy of his race; he who beguiled from another a genuine tear, made heavenly wind visit his heart with a cool odor of paradise! What was there for her to do?
But possibly Hester might neither have begun nor gone on thinking thus, had it not been for a sense of power within her springing from, or at least associated with, a certain special gift which she had all her life, under the faithful care of her mother, been cultivating. Endowed with a passion for music—what is a true passion but a heavenly hunger?—which she indulged; relieved, strengthened, nor ever sated, by a continuous study of both theoretical and practical music, she approached both piano and organ with eager yet withholding foot, each as a great and effectual door ready to open into regions of delight. But she was gifted also with a fine contralto voice, of exceptional scope and flexibility, whose capacity of being educated into an organ of expression was not thrown away upon one who had a world inside her to express—doubtless as yet not a little chaotic, but in process of assuming form that might demand utterance; and this angelic instrument had for some years been under careful training. And now this night came to Hester, if not for the first time, yet more clearly than ever before, the thought whether she might not in some way make use of this her one gift for the service she desired—for the comfort, that was, and the uplifting of humanity, especially such humanity as had sunk below even its individual level. Thus instinctively she sought relief from sympathetic pain in the alleviation and removal of its cause.
But pity and instinctive recoil from pain were by no means all the elements of the impulse moving Hester in this direction. An honest and active mind such as hers could not have carried her so often to church and for so long a time, whatever might be the nature of the direct teaching she there received, without gaining some glimpses of the mightiest truth of our being, that we belong to God in actual fact of spiritual property and profoundest relationship. She had much to learn in this direction yet—as who has not who is ages in advance of life?—but this night came back to her, as it had often already returned, the memory of a sermon she had heard some twelve months before on the text, "Glorify God in your body, and in your spirit, which are God's." It was a dull enough sermon, yet not so dull but it enabled her to supply in some degree its own lack; and when she went out of the dark church into the sunshine,—and heard the birds singing as if they knew without any St. Francis to tell them that their bodies and their spirits were God's, a sense awoke in her such as she had not had before, that the grand voice lying like an unborn angel in the chest and throat of her, belonged not to herself but to God, and must be used in some way for the working of his will in the world which as well as the voice he had made. She had no real notion yet of what is meant by the glory of God. She had not quite learned that simplest of high truths that the glory of God is the beauty of Christ's face. She had a lingering idea—a hideously frightful one, though its vagueness kept it in great measure from injuring her—that the One only good, the One only unselfish thought a great deal of himself, and looked strictly after his rights in the way of homage. Hence she thought first of devoting the splendor and richness of her voice to swell the song of some church-choir. With her notion of God and of her relation to him, how could she yet have escaped the poor pagan fancy—good for a pagan, but beggarly for a Christian, that church and its goings-on are a serving of God? She had not begun to ask how these were to do God any good—or if my reader objects to the phrase, I will use a common one saying the same thing—how these were to do anything for God. She had not begun to see that God is the one great servant of all, and that the only way to serve him is to be a fellow-servant with him—to be, say, a nurse in his nursery, and tend this or that lonely, this or that rickety child of his. She had not yet come to see that it is as absurd to call song and prayer a serving of God, as it would be to say the thief on the cross did something for Christ in consenting to go with him to paradise. But now some dim perception of this truth began to wake in her. Vaguely she began to feel that perhaps God had given her this voice and this marriage of delight and power in music and song for some reason like that for which he had made the birds the poets of the animal world: what if her part also should be to drive dull care away? what if she too were intended to be a door-keeper in the house of God, and open or keep open windows in heaven that the air of the high places might reach the low swampy ground? If while she sang, her soul mounted on the wings of her song till it fluttered against the latticed doors of heaven as a bird flutters against the wires of its cage; if also God has made of one blood all nations of men—why, then, surely her song was capable of more than carrying merely herself up into the regions of delight! Nay more, might there not from her throat go forth a trumpet-cry of truth among such as could hear and respond to the cry? Then, when the humblest servant should receive the reward of his well-doing, she would not be left outside, but enter into the joy of her Lord. How specially such work might be done by her she did not yet see, but the truth had drawn nigh her that, to serve God in any true sense, we must serve him where he needs service—among his children lying in the heart of lack, in sin and pain and sorrow; and she saw that, if she was to serve at all, it must be with her best, with her special equipment.
I need not follow the gradations, unmarked of herself, by which she at length came to a sort of conclusion: the immediate practical result was, that she gave herself more than ever to the cultivation of her gift, seeing in the distance the possibility of her becoming, in one mode or another, or in all modes perhaps together, a songstress to her generation.
TRULY THE LIGHT IS SWEET.
The cry of the human heart in all ages and in every moment is, "Where is God and how shall I find him?"—No, friend, I will not accept your testimony to the contrary—not though you may be as well fitted as ever one of eight hundred millions to come forward with it. You take it for granted that you know your own heart because you call it yours, but I say that your heart is a far deeper thing than you know or are capable of knowing. Its very nature is hid from you. I use but a poor figure when I say that the roots of your heart go down beyond your knowledge—whole eternities beyond it—into the heart of God. If you have never yet made one discovery in your heart, your testimony concerning it is not worth a tuft of flue; and if you have made discoveries in it, does not the fact reveal that it is but little known to you, and that there must be discoveries innumerable yet to be made in it? To him who has been making discoveries in it for fifty years, the depths of his heart are yet a mystery—a mystery, however, peopled with loveliest hopes. I repeat whether the man knows it or not, his heart in its depths is ever crying out for God.
Where the man does not know it, it is because the unfaithful Self, a would-be monarch, has usurped the consciousness; the demon-man is uppermost, not Christ-man; he is down in the crying heart, and the demon-man—that is the self that worships itself—is trampling on the heart and smothering it up in the rubbish of ambitions, lusts, and cares. If ever its cry reaches that Self, it calls it childish folly, and tramples the harder. It does not know that a child crying on God is mightier than a warrior dwelling in steel.
If we had none but fine weather, the demon-Self would be too much for the divine-Self, and would always keep it down; but bad weather, misfortune, ill-luck, adversity, or whatever name but punishment or the love of God men may call it, sides with the Christ-self down below, and helps to make its voice heard. On the other hand if we had nothing but bad weather, the hope of those in whom the divine Self is slowly rising would grow too faint; while those in whom the bad weather had not yet begun to work good would settle down into weak, hopeless rebellion. Without hope can any man repent?
To the people at Burcliff came at length a lovely morning, with sky and air like the face of a repentant child—a child who has repented so thoroughly that the sin has passed from him, and he is no longer even ashamed. The water seemed dancing in the joy of a new birth, and the wind, coming and going in gentle conscious organ-like swells, was at it with them, while the sun kept looking merrily down on the glad commotion his presence caused.
"Ah," thought the mother, as she looked from her windows ere she began to dress for this new live day, "how would it be if the Light at the heart of the sun were shining thus on the worlds made in his image!"
She was thinking of her boy, whom perhaps, in all the world, she only was able to love heartily—there was so little in the personal being of the lad, that is, in the thing he was to himself, and was making of himself, to help anyone to love him! But in the absolute mere existence is reason for love, and upon that God does love—so love, that he will suffer and cause suffering for the development of that existence into a thing in its own full nature lovable, namely, an existence in its own will one with the perfect love whence it issued; and the mother's heart more than any other God has made is like him in power of loving. Alas that she is so seldom like him in wisdom—so often thwarting the work of God, and rendering more severe his measures with her child by her attempts to shield him from His law, and save him from saving sorrow. How often from his very infancy—if she does not, like the very nurse she employs, actively teach him to be selfish—does she get between him and the right consequences of his conduct, as if with her one feeble loving hand, she would stay the fly-wheel of the holy universe. It is the law that the man who does evil shall suffer; it is the only hope for him, and a hope for the neighbor he wrongs. When he forsakes his evil, one by one the dogs of suffering will halt and drop away from his track; and he will find at last they have but hounded him into the land of his nativity, into the home of his Father in heaven.
As soon as breakfast was over, the whole family set out for a walk. Mr. Raymount seldom left the house till after lunch, but even he, who cared comparatively little for the open air, had grown eager after it. Streets, hills and sands were swarming with human beings, all drawn out by the sun.
"I sometimes wonder," he said, "that so many people require so little to make them happy. Let but the sun break through the clouds, and he sets them all going like ants in an ant-hill!"
"Yes," returned his wife, "but then see how little on the other hand is required to make them miserable! Let the sun hide his head for a day, and they grumble!"
Making the remark, the good woman never thought of her son Cornelius, the one of her family whose conduct illustrated it. At the moment she saw him cheerful, and her love looked upon him as good. She was one of the best of women herself: whatever hour she was called, her lamp was sure to have oil in it; and yet all the time since first he lay in her arms, I doubt if she had ever done anything to help the youth to conquer himself. Now it was too late, even had she known what could be done. But the others had so far turned out well: why should not this one also? The moment his bad humors were over, she looked on him as reformed; and when he uttered worldliness, she persuaded herself he was but jesting. But alas! she had no adequate notion—not a shadow of one—of the selfishness of the man-child she had given to the world. This matter of the black sheep in the white flock is one of the most mysterious of the facts of spiritual generation.
Sometimes, indeed, the sheep is by no means so black as to the whiter ones he seems; perhaps neither are they so much whiter as their friends and they themselves think; for to be altogether respectable is not to be clean; and the black sheep may be all the better than some of the rest that he looks what he is, and does not dye his wool. But on the other hand he may be a great deal worse than some of his own family think him.
"Then," said Hester, after a longish pause, "those that need more to make them happy, are less easily made unhappy?"
To this question rather than remark, she received no reply. Her father and mother both felt it not altogether an easy one to answer: it suggested points requiring consideration. To Cornelius, it was a mere girl's speech, not worth heeding where the girl was his sister. He turned up at it a mental nose, the merest of snubs; and well he might, for he had not the least notion of what it meant or involved.
As little notion had his father that his son Cornelius was a black sheep. He was not what the world would have called a black sheep, but his father, could he have seen into him, would have counted him a very black sheep indeed—and none the whiter that he recognized in the blackness certain shades that were of paternal origin. It was, however, only to the rest of the family that Cornelius showed his blackness: of his father he was afraid; and that father, being proud of his children, would have found it hard to believe anything bad of them: like his faults they were his own! His faith in his children was in no small measure conceit of that which was his, and blinded him to their faults as it blinded him to some of his own. The discovery of any serious fault in one of them would be a sore wound to his vanity, a destruction of his self-content.
The co-existence of good and evil in the same person is perhaps the most puzzling of all facts. What a shock it gives one to hear a woman who loves God, and spends both time and money on the betterment of her kind, call a pauper child a brat, and see her turn with disgust from the idea of treating any strange child, more especially one of low birth, as her own. "O Christ!" cries the heart, "is this one of the women that follows thee?" And she is one of the women that follow him—only she needs such a lesson as he gave his disciples through the Syrophenician woman.
Mr. Raymount had such an opinion of himself, that while he never obtruded his opinions upon others, he never imagined them disregarded in his own family. It never entered his mind that any member of it might in this or that think differently from himself. But both his wife and Hester were able to think, and did think for themselves, as they were bound in the truth of things to do; and there were considerable divergements of the paths in which they walked from that he had trodden. He had indeed always taken too much for granted, and ought to have used more pains to have his notions understood by them, if he laid so much on their intellectual sympathy. He supposed all the three read what he wrote; and his wife and daughter did read the most of it; but what would he think when he came to know that his son not only read next to nothing of it, but read that little with a contempt not altogether unconscious—for no other reason than that it was his father who wrote it? Nor was the youth quite without justification—for was he not himself a production of his father? But then he looked upon the latter as one of altogether superior quality! It is indeed strange how vulgar minds despise the things they have looked upon and their hands have handled, just because they have looked upon them and their hands have handled them; is there not in the fact a humiliating lesson, which yet they are unable to read, of the degrading power of their own presence upon themselves and their judgments? Whether a man is a hero to his valet or the opposite, depends as much on the valet as on the man: The bond, then, between the father and the son, was by no means so strong as the father thought it. Indeed the selfishness of Cornelius made him almost look upon his father as his enemy, because of his intentions with regard to the division of his property. And selfishness rarely fails of good arguments. Nor can anything destroy it but such a turning of things upside down as only he that made them can work.
THE AQUARIUM.
"Let's go and see the people at the aquarium," said Cornelius.
"Do you mean the fishes?" asked his father.
"No, I don't care about them; I said the people," answered Cornelius stupidly.
"The people of an aquarium must surely be fishes, eh, Saffy?" said the father to the bright child, walking hand in hand with him. It was Josephine. Her eyes were so blue that but for the association he would have called her Sapphira. Between the two he contented himself with the pet name of Saffy.
"Ah but, papa," said Hester, "Corney didn't say the people of the aquarium, but the people at the aquarium!"
"Two of you are too many for me!" returned the father playfully. "Well, then, Saffy, let us go and see the people of and the people at the aquarium.—Which do you want to see, Hester?"
"Oh, the fishes of course, papa!"
"Why of course?"
"Because they're so much more interesting than the people," said Hester rebuked in herself as she said it—before she knew why.
"Fishes more interesting than people!" exclaimed her father.
"They're so like people, papa!"
"Oh, then surely the people must be the more interesting after all, if it is the likeness of the fishes to people that makes them interesting! Which of all the people you love do you see likest a fish now?"
"Oh, papa!"
"What! is it only people you hate that you see like fishes?"
"I don't hate anybody, papa."
"There's a way of not caring about people, though—looking down on them and seeing them like fishes, that's precious like hating them," said Cornelius, who enjoyed a crowd, and putting his sister in the wrong still better: to that end he could easily say a sensible thing.
"If you mean me, Corney, I think you do me injustice," said Hester. "The worst I do is to look at them the wrong way of the telescope."
"But why do you never see anyone you love like a fish?" persisted her father.
"Perhaps because I could not love anybody that was like a fish."
"Certainly there is something not beautiful about them!" said Mr. Raymount.
"They're beastly ugly," said Cornelius.
"Let us look into it a little," continued his father. "What is it about them that is ugly? Their colors are sometimes very beautiful—and their shapes, too."
"Their heads and faces," said Hester, "are the only parts of them in which they can be like human beings, and those are very ugly."
"I'm not sure that you are right, Hester," said the mother, who had not spoken till now. "There must surely be something human in their bodies as well, for now and then I see their ways and motions so like those of men and women, that I felt for a moment almost as if I understood how they were feeling, and were just going to know what they were thinking."
"I suspect," said Mr. Raymount, "your mother's too much of a poet to be trusted alone in an aquarium. It would have driven Shelley crazy—to judge from his Sensitive Plant."
They had now reached the middle of the descent to the mysteries of the place, when Cornelius, who, with an interest Hester could not understand in him, and which was partly owing to a mere love of transition, had been staring at the ascending faces, uttered a cry of recognition, and darted down to the next landing. With a degree of respect he seldom manifested they saw him there accost a gentleman leaning over the balustrade, and shake hands with him. He was several years older than Cornelius, not a few inches taller, and much better-looking—one indeed who could hardly fail to attract notice even in a crowd. Corney's weakest point, next to his heart, was his legs, which perhaps accounted for his worship of Mr. Vavasor's calves, in themselves nothing remarkable. He was already glancing stolen looks at these objects of his jealous admiration when the rest reached the landing, and Mr. Raymount, willing to know his son's friend, desired Corney to introduce him.
Cornelius had been now eighteen months in the bank, and had never even mentioned the name of a fellow clerk. He was one of those youths who take the only possible way for emptiness to make itself of consequence—that of concealment and affected mystery. Not even now but for his father's request, would he have presented his bank friend to him or any of the family.
The manners and approach of Mr. Vavasor were such as at once to recommend him to the friendly reception of all, from Mr. Raymount to little Saffy, who had the rare charm of being shy without being rude. If not genial, his manners were yet friendly, and his carriage if not graceful was easy; both were apt to be abrupt where he was familiar. It was a kind of company bearing he had, but dashed with indifference, except where he desired to commend himself. He shook hands with little Saffy as respectfully as with her mother, but with neither altogether respectfully; and immediately the pale-faced, cold, loving boy, Mark, unwillingly, therefore almost unconsciously, disliked him. He was beyond question handsome, with a Grecian nose nearly perfect, which had its large part in the aristocratic look he bore. This was favored also by the simplicity of his dress. He turned with them, and re-descended the stairs.
"Why didn't you tell me you were coming, Mr. Vavasor? I could have met you," said Cornelius, with just a little stretch of the degree of familiarity in use between them.
"I didn't know myself till the last minute," answered Vavasor. "It was a sudden resolve of my aunt's. Neither had I the remotest idea you were here."
"Have you been seeing the fishes?" asked Hester, at whose side their new acquaintance was walking now they had reached the subterranean level.
"I have just passed along their cages," he answered. "They are not well kept; the glass is dirty, and the water, too. I fancied they looked unhappy, and came away. I can't bear to see creatures pining. It would be a good deed to poison them all."
"Wouldn't it be better to give them some fresh water?" said little Saffy, "that would make them glad."
To this wisdom there was no response.
When they came to the door of the concert-room, Cornelius turned into it, leaving his "friend" with his "people" to go and look at the fishes. Mr. Vavasor kept his place by the side of Hester.
"We were just talking, when we had the pleasure of meeting you, about people and fishes—comparing them in a way," said Hester. "I can't make it clear to myself why I like seeing the fishes better than the people."
"I fancy it must be because you call them fishes and not fish," replied Vavasor. "If the fishes were a shoal of herrings or mackerel, I doubt if you would—at least for many times. If, on the other hand, the men and women in the concert-room were as oddly distinguished one from another as these different fishes, you would prefer going with your brother."
"I'm sure I shouldn't" said Saffy to Mark.
"Phizzes is best on fishes," answered Mark sententiously. "I like faces best; only you don't always want to look at what you like best!—I wonder why."
"And yet I suspect," said Mrs. Raymount to Vavasor, "many of the people are as much distinguished from each other in character as the fishes are in form."
"Possibly," interjected her husband, "they are as different in their faces also, only we are too much of their kind to be able to read the differences so clearly."
"Surely you do not mean," said Vavasor respectfully, "that any two persons in the concert-room can be as much unlike each other as that flounder shuddering along the sandy bottom, and that yard of eel sliding through the water like an embodied wickedness?"
Hester was greatly struck with the poetic tone of the remark.
"I think you may find people as different," replied her father, "if you take into the account the more delicate as well as the more striking differences—the deeper as well as the surface diversities. Now you make me think of it, I begin to doubt whether all these live grotesques may not have been made to the pattern of different developments of humanity."
"Look at that dog-fish," said Vavasor, pointing to the largest in the tank. "What a brute! Don't you hate him, Miss Raymount?"
"I am not willing to hate any live thing," answered Hester with a smile, "—from selfish motives, perhaps; I feel as if it would be to my own loss, causing me some kind of irreparable hurt."
"But you would kill such a creature as that—would you not?" he rejoined.
"In possible circumstances," she answered; "but killing and hating have nothing necessarily to do with each other. He that hates his brother is always a murderer, not always he that kills him."
"This is another sort of girl from any I've met yet!" said Vavasor to himself. "I wonder what she's really like!"
He did not know that what she was really like was just what he, with all his fancied knowledge of women both in life and literature, was incapable of seeing—so different was she in kind from poor-gentleman Vavasor.
"But just look at the head, eyes and mouth of the fiend!" he persisted.
Hester, forcing herself a little, did regard the animal for two or three minutes. Then a slight shudder passed through her, and she turned away her eyes.
"I see you've caught the look of him!" said Vavasor. "Is he not a horror?"
"He is. But that was not what made me turn away: I found if I looked a moment longer I should hate him in spite of myself."
"And why shouldn't you hate him? You would be doing the wretch no wrong. Even if he knew it, it would be only what he deserved."
"That you cannot tell except you knew all about his nature, and every point of his history from the beginning of the creation till now. I dare not judge even a dog-fish. And whatever his deserts, I don't choose to hate him, because I don't choose to hate."
She turned away, and Vavasor saw she wanted no more of the dog-fish.
"Oh!" cried Saffy, with a face of terror, "look, look, mamma! It's staring at me!"
The child hid her face in her mother's gown, yet turned immediately to look again.
Mr. Raymount looked also, following her gaze, and was fascinated by the sight that met his eyes. Through the glass, high above his head, and not far from the surface, he saw a huge thornback, bending toward them and seeming to look down on them, as it flew slowly through the water—the action of the two sides of its body fringed with fins, and its consequent motion, were much more like the act of flying than that of swimming. Behind him floated his long tail, making him yet more resemble the hideously imagined kite which he at once suggested. But the terrible thing about him was the death's-head look of the upper part of him. His white belly was of course toward them, and his eyes were on the other side, but there were nostrils that looked exactly like the empty sockets of eyes, and below them was a hideous mouth. These made the face that seemed to Saffy to be hovering over and watching them.
"Like an infernal angel of death!" thought Mr. Raymount, but would not rouse yet more the imagination of the little one by saying it. Hester gazed with steadfast mien at the floating spectre.
"You seem in no danger from that one," said Vavasor.
"I don't think I understand you," said Hester. "What danger can there be from any of them?"
"I mean of hating him."
"You are right; I do not feel the smallest inclination to hate him."
"Yet the ray is even uglier than the dog-fish."
"That may be—I think not—but who hates for ugliness? I never should. Ugliness only moves my pity."
"Then what do you hate for?" asked Vavasor. "—But I beg your pardon: you never hate! Let me ask then, what is it that makes you feel as if you might hate?"
"If you will look again at the dog-fish, and tell me the expression of its mouth, I may be able to answer you," she returned.
"I will," said Vavasor; and, betaking himself to a farther portion of the tank, he stood there watching a little shoal of those sharks of the northern seas. While he was gone Cornelius rejoined them.
"I wish I knew why God made such ugly creatures," said Saffy to Mark.
The boy gave a curious half-sad smile, without turning his eyes from the thornback, and said nothing.
"Do you know why God made any creatures, pet?" said Hester.
"No, I don't. Why did he, Hessy?"
"I am almost afraid to guess. But if you don't know why he made any, why should you wonder that he made those?"
"Because they are so ugly.—Do tell me why he made them?" she added coaxingly.
"You had better ask mamma."
"But, Hessy, I don't like to ask mamma."
"Why don't you like to ask mamma, you little goose?"
"Because," said Saffy, who was all the time holding her mother's hand, and knew she was hearing her, "mamma mightn't know what to say."
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Home / Topics / Most Viewed / Samsung CEO’s 2-Dollar Lip Balm Spurs Public Interest
Samsung CEO’s 2-Dollar Lip Balm Spurs Public Interest
Posted on December 8, 2016 by Korea Bizwire in Most Viewed, National, Social Affairs, Top News with 0 Comments
The lip balm was brought to attention when Lee Jae-yong, the heir-apparent of the Samsung empire, routinely applied the lip protectant during the hearing. (image: Yonhap)
SEOUL, Dec. 8 (Korea Bizwire) – The biggest beneficiary of Tuesday’s parliamentary hearing of eight Korean conglomerate chiefs into the Choi Soon-sil scandal was neither the investigative parliamentary committee, nor the prosecutors; it was Softlips, a lip balm lineup from American health care products maker The Mentholatum Company.
The lip balm was brought to attention when Lee Jae-yong, the current vice chairman and the heir-apparent of the Samsung empire, routinely applied the lip protectant, covering his mouth with the other hand, during the hearing.
Although the hearing itself was fruitless – mostly filled with canned response with chiefs unwilling to give away any information that might play to their disadvantage in the investigation – it did spark a question among netizens as to “how does Korea’s richest man (third, technically) look after his lips?”
Upon the discovery that it was a Softlips product priced at mere $1.99 in the U.S., online communities and SNS realms filled with interest, curiosity, and surprise such that at one point on Wednesday “Lee Jae-yong Lip Balm” even ranked second in terms of the most searched terms on Naver, Korea’s biggest web portal.
Celebrities or popular public figures like Lee Jae-yong wearing or using specific items from certain brands is always an interesting bit of gossip for the public, and a good promotional tool for companies. But this interest doubles when they’re using cheaper, more affordable products, often coming as a shocker to the general population.
Such was the case for Yoo Jae-suk, Korea’s most paid comedian and MC, when he was spotted in 2014 wearing a 40-dollar watch on an MBC entertainment program Infinity Challenge, a highly thrifty accessory for someone who’s rumored to be paid some $10,000 for each of the episodes he hosts every week.
The watch was also revealed to be a charity product with its manufacturer donating 30 percent of the proceeds to humanitarian causes around the world.
Similarly, Sohn Suk-hee, one of Korea’s most revered journalists, was recently seen wearing a 24,500-won ($21.12) watch, again attracting much public attention, and he was praised for his frugality.
Sohn was ranked third this year as the Person of the Year by college students. He currently serves as the president of JTBC (while at the same time presenting its flagship newscast Newsroom) which played a key role in bringing to light significant evidence of the Choi Soon-sil scandal.
By Joseph Shin (jss539@koreabizwire.com)
Lee Jae-yong
Sohn Suk-hee
Yoo Jae-suk
Gov’t to Ease Regulations on Autonomous, Hydrogen Cars
Roadmap to Future of Industry May Lie in Big Piles of Patents
Reading in South Korea Hits New Low
Ban Tops Presidential Surveys after Hinting at Candidacy
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Politics and human rights
25.03.2016 | Viktoria Veselova, Pavlo Kazarin
Two Years After Annexation, Crimeans Wait On Russia’s Unfulfilled Promises
Russia accuses Ukraine of ‘annexing’ the Crimea
Russia says Poland, not USSR, was Hitler’s Ally and Responsible for Holocaust
Crimean Tatar Mejlis given 24 hours to leave
Punitive Psychiatry against Crimean Tatar leader for insisting Russia must leave Crimea
Targeting the Crimean Tatar Mejlis as pro-Russian euphoria fades in Crimea
Chubarov: Crimea is descending into Terror and Fear
Affront or Offensive? Russian OMON block Mustafa Dzhemilev
A Russian Orthodox priest attends a rally marking the second anniversary of Russia’s annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea region in the Black Sea port of Sevastopol on March 18.
http://www.rferl.org/content/crimea-annexation-two-years-unfulfilled-promises/27621753.html
For many in Crimea, the Ukrainian Black Sea peninsula’s takeover by Russia two years ago was a cause for joy and great expectations.
In the run-up to the March 16, 2014, referendum in Crimea -- which has not been recognized as legitimate by the international community -- Moscow and pro-Russian figures on the peninsula promised locals a glittering and prosperous future that would contrast sharply with the fates of Ukrainians under the control of what the Kremlin branded the "fascist junta" in Kyiv.
Two years after the annexation, however, many of Russia’s promises remain unfulfilled. Although many Crimeans feel that the annexation saved the peninsula from the kind of violence that has wracked parts of eastern Ukraine – which is what they were told by Moscow -- many continue to wait for the living-standard improvements they were led to expect.
Among the most prominent promises was the pledge of a genuinely multiethnic and multiconfessional region with three official languages -- Russian, Ukrainian, and Crimean Tatar.
Russian President Vladimir Putin himself made this explicit pledge in his speech to the Russian parliament on March 18, 2014:
"We treat all nationalities living in Crimea with respect, " Putin said. "It is their common home, their little motherland. Thus it would be right -- and I know that people in Crimea support this idea -- to introduce three official languages in Crimea: Russian, Ukrainian, and Crimean Tatar."
This promise is also enshrined in Article 10 of the Crimean constitution adopted in December 2014 by the Russian authorities that control the peninsula.
The reality over the last two years, however, has been quite different.
"In commerce, in everyday life, in education, there is no equality of languages in Crimea, " says local activist Veldar Shukurdzhiyev of the Ukrainian Cultural Center. "It exists only formally, on paper."
Even before annexation, there was only one Ukrainian language upper school in the Crimean capital, Simferopol. Immediately after annexation, its leadership was replaced and its lessons switched entirely to Russian. In ordinary schools, Ukrainian language lessons have been reduced to a bare minimum.
The Crimean Tatar ruling body, the Mejlis, reports that Crimean Tatar teachers have been deprived of their pedagogical qualifications and forced to give Crimean Tatar language classes after school hours.
The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) wrote in a report last summer: "Instruction in Ukrainian and the study of Ukrainian is being restricted in Crimea because of pressure on school administrations, teachers, parents, and children with the goal ending the teaching of Ukrainian. This could in the future lead to the limitation of Ukrainian culture and language on the peninsula. Teaching in Crimean Tatar and the study of Crimean Tatar is encountering restrictions and problems because of the annexation and is in need of support and regeneration."
ALSO READ: Russia Celebrates Crimea Grab, Critics Slam ’Climate Of Fear’
The story with the Russian-installed administration’s economic promises has been mixed. Officials pledged to reduce the retirement age and increase pensions and salaries for state-sector workers and this has been largely accomplished. Immediately after annexation, pensions and state-sector salaries were raised 25 percent per month until they reached Russian standards.
"But immediately prices began to increase and sanctions were imposed, both international and Ukrainian, " says local economic reporter Andriy Yanitskiy. "In 2015, Russia reindexed its pensions and its salaries and things turned out to be not as attractive as had been promised."
The United States, the European Union, and other countries have imposed sanctions on Russia over the annexation of Crimea and its support for separatists in eastern Ukraine.
Yanitskiy notes that some key social groups -- military and security forces, pensioners, administrative officials, and top managers -- have benefited enormously because they constitute "the foundation of the Russian regime in Crimea." He estimates that the city administration in the port city of Sevastopol has swollen to more than 2, 000 employees and "they all have good salaries."
"But, at the same time, Crimea prices today are higher than prices in Kyiv, " he concludes. "You need to take into account the purchasing power of those salaries -- how many groceries they can buy and what quality goods are available."
Moreover, the pay raises have largely reached only top administrators of state institutions like schools and hospitals.
"Average teachers and doctors don’t get such impressive salaries, " Yanitskiy says. "On top of this, there have been problems with service personnel in schools and hospitals getting their salaries at all."
’Russia’s Great Pyriamid’
According to the Russian government, average wages in Crimea are lower than those of almost any region of Russia.
Russian officials also promised that annexation would be a boon to Crimea’s tourism industry and that commercial flights would be started from Sevastopol’s Belbek airport in the summer of 2014. The plan to begin such flights has now been postponed until late spring of this year.
And Russian officials have said the level of service at Crimean resorts is below national standards.
Government activity in the tourism sector has been largely limited to the redistribution and privatization of resorts, including resorts that were the private property of Ukrainian citizens.
Pro-Russian authorities also promised in 2014 to end Crimea’s reliance on the rest of Ukraine for the lion’s share of its water. Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev announced a plan to build a desalination plant, new reservoirs, and a water pipeline from Russia’s Kuban region.
No progress has been made on any of these initiatives and Crimea’s water has been supplied by pumping out deep aquifers, a strategy that environmentalists warn will result in disaster.
Sevastopol’s pro-Russian administration head Aleksei Chaly pledged to build in his city a technology center comparable to Silicon Valley. Putin himself endorsed the 2 billion ruble plan, but no work on the project has begun.
As for the ongoing construction of a bridge across the Kerch Strait to link Crimea with Russia, Yanitskiy is somewhat more optimistic.
"I can believe they will actually finish the Kerch bridge because it is an ideological project, sort of Russia’s Great Pyramid, " he says. "But, by the way, Russia has been building a bridge across the Amur River to link China and Russia since 1995. But with Kerch, there is no choice -- without it, maintaining Crimea is very expensive."
Robert Coalson contributed to this report
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Human Rights Abuses in Russian-occupied Crimea
04.09.2018 | Halya Coynash
Ukraine ‘forgets’ to sanction Putin cronies & Russian firms involved in building illegal Crimea bridge
Sanctions over Crimea bridge (image Radio Lemberg), Prigozhin (standing over) Putin
Empty ‘positive signals’ used to justify another western cave-in over sanctions
Stand up to Putin: buy Polish apples!
German Scooter band breaches Crimea sanctions, incites fans to break the law
Russian banks cut off from SWIFT for working in Crimea
Trump is on collision course with international law over Crimea
What should they talk about, Mr Putin?
Trump’s man in Moscow claims ‘misinformation’ about Crimea, Ukraine was ‘catastrophic’ & sanctions don’t work
Ukraine lacks legislative mechanisms to punish individuals and businesses who violate sanctions linked with Russia’s annexation of Crimea. This, however, is only part of the problem, since there are a suspicious number of individuals or legal entities, sanctioned by the USA over Crimea, who are eluding inclusion in Ukraine’s list of offenders.
Valentina Samar from the Centre for Journalist Investigations has carried out a major investigation into who is slipping off the radar in Ukraine, and why. Despite the promises issued by Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko to increase sanctions against Russia and to synchronise the US and Ukrainian sanction lists, these remain just words. At present a considerable number of Russian companies; public figures and businessmen, sanctioned by the USA, are not subject to any Ukrainian sanctions.
The Centre for Journalist Investigations compared the list produced by OFAC, the Office of Foreign Assets Control of the US Department of the Treasury and that drawn up by RNBO, Ukraine’s National Security and Defence Council, and found 40 companies and 25 officials and businessmen from Russia whom RNBO had somehow ‘forgotten’. And this, Samar points out, was after RNBO was forced to ‘clarify’ its list after MP Serhiy Leshchenko pointed to omissions in June this year.
Leshchenko is not the only MP concerned by such omissions. Svitlana Zalishchuk has also sought to challenge Poroshenko on the ‘holes’ in Ukraine’s sanction list. The fact that some companies and individuals have been omitted, she says, indicates that there are those for whom this is convenient.
The updated list published in June had still omitted certain Russian oligarchs, such as Oleg Deripaska, Igor Rotenberg and Viktor Vekselberg who are all on the OFAC list and for very good reason. This was despite assurances given by Poroshenko on 10 April 2018, during talks with Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Samar notes that the oligarchs were subsequently added to Ukraine’s list, however some of their companies remain stubbornly missing to this day. This is despite the fact that the USA refused to remove six aluminium companies belonging to Deripaska from its black list even after Deripaska reduced his share in them.
The list of omissions includes, quite incredibly, “СГМ-Мост”, a main company involved in Russia’s illegal construction of a bridge from Russia to Crimea. “СГМ-Мост” is a daughter company of Stroygazmontazh, owned by Arkadiy Roterberg, a man close to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has been under sanctions since 2014.
It includes others linked to this bridge also, including the Crimea First Insurance Company’; «СТГ-Эко», «ДСК”, and ФАУ Главгосэкспертиза России»
It is no less disturbing that RNBO has not seen fit to place the company «Силовые машины» owned by Oleksiy Mordashov under sanctions. This company was involved in the delivery to Crimea, bypassing international sanctions, of Siemens gas turbines in July 2017.
At least seven companies owned by another Putin oligarch crony, Gennady Timchenko, have also been omitted, as have companies from the group “Совфрахт – Совмортранс”, which are involved in transportation of both military and civilian loads to Crimea.
The list of individuals whose activities the National Security and Defence Council has not seen the need to impose sanctions on is also staggering. If the omission of Vladyslav Surkov, Putin’s ‘aide’ on occupied Donbas, could just conceivably be aimed at not obstructing negotiations on the release of hostages and political prisoners, there is no good reason for the failure to include Yevgeny Prigozhin. This individual, often referred to as ‘Putin’s chef’, went from serving a long prison sentence for serious crimes and then selling fast food on the streets, to become a billionaire. He is presumably paying for his vast wealth by funding the notorious Internet ‘troll factory’ in St. Petersburg, and the Wagner unit which sends highly-trained mercenaries to kill Ukrainians in Donbas.
Attempts to attribute all these omissions to poor coordination between different departments are hampered by the fact that “all the above-mentioned Russian oligarchs had or still have considerable assets in Ukraine which they were allowed to either sell or to move to offshore companies”.
Mykhailo Honchar, President of the ‘Strategy XXI’ Centre for Global Studies, believes that Ukraine’s inadequate policy on sanctions can be attributed to ties that were built over decades. Many of these links were particularly cemented during the Putin years, and cover both the previous regime under Viktor Yanukovych and those now in power.
The fact that many Ukrainian oligarchs and politicians have financial interests in Russia should also not be forgotten. In both this and an earlier study, the Centre for Journalist Investigations probed the manner in which Rinat Akhmetov, Ukraine’s richest oligarch, has managed to bypass sanctions on Crimea (to be reviewed separately).
Samar points out that Ukrainian oligarchs, like Akhmetov and Dmitry Firtash, and politicians have also received the possibility to carry on business in Crimea which western sanctions prohibit via a highly controversial ‘law on making Crimea a free economic zone’. The law was condemned by human rights groups back in 2014 both because it discriminated against Crimeans and because it made it possible for Ukrainians to continue business as usual on occupied territory, thus aiding the aggressor state (details here).
It is such measures and those who benefited from them that clearly demonstrate what Samar calls “the deliberate inadequacy of Ukraine’s sanction policy”.
Zalishchuk notes an important aspect to all of these shenanigans, namely the damage they do to all Ukraine’s diplomacy. Those now protesting against North Stream 2 and awaiting sanctions from USA against European companies involved in it can be confronted with legitimate questions about Ukraine’s sanction policy which selectively imposes sanctions so as to not hurt the economic interests of certain Russian oligarchs or companies, or Ukrainian-Russian companies.
Another problem lies in the lack of any mechanisms in Ukrainian legislation for punishing those who violate sanctions. There are quite simply no administrative or criminal penalties envisaged. Ihor Ponovovny, Deputy Prosecutor for the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, explained in an interview to the Centre for Journalist Investigations, that, given the lack of a relevant article to Ukraine’s Criminal Code, all they can do is, for example, to accuse boats of illegally entering occupied territory or of violating Ukraine’s state border (Article 332-1 of the Criminal Code, introduced in July 2014).
A glaring example of how inadequate this is was seen in Ukraine’s arrest in February 2018 of Nefterudovoz 45М when it tried to moor in Kherson Port after having shipped a large amount of ilmenite ore from Turkey to occupied Crimea. It was reported at the time that the only enterprise in Crimea using such ore was the ‘Crimean Titan’ factory belonging to Ukrainian oligarch Firtash. Shortly afterwards, a Ukrainian court revoked the boat’s arrest.
Ponochovny provided a list of companies who are known to be infringing western sanctions in occupied Crimea, but whom they have no way of prosecuting. This, he says, is also because Ukraine has not introduced any sectoral sanctions.
They have tried to initiate criminal proceedings against Peugeot, the Auchan supermarket chain and the Internet site Booking.com for enabling people to book hotels, etc. in Crimea. All of these and other forms of business activity are in clear breach of sanctions, yet can seemingly not be touched. As well as the lack of sectoral sanctions, Ponochovny also mentions the Law on making Crimea a free economic zone which, four years after Russia’s illegal invasion and annexation of Crimea and in spite of mounting human rights violations, is still giving carte blanche to Ukrainian business activities on occupied territory.
See also: Siemens is not alone in helping Russia to breach sanctions over Crimea
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Hospital Transparency Measures To Analyze Efficacy
Concerning hospital transparency measures required to analyze the efficacy of hospital delivery system reform incentive payments.
Health Care & Health Insurance
Hospitals - healthcare affordability and sustainability enterprise board - annual hospital expenditure report - hospital report card and hospital charge report recommendations. The act requires the department of health care policy and financing (department), in consultation with the Colorado healthcare affordability and sustainability enterprise board, to develop and prepare an annual report detailing uncompensated hospital costs and the different categories of expenditures made by hospitals in the state (hospital expenditure report). In compiling the hospital expenditure report, the department shall use publicly available data sources whenever possible. Each hospital in the state is required to make available to the department certain information.
Prior to issuing the hospital expenditure report, each hospital referenced in the report has 15 days to review the report and submit clarifications or corrections to the department. Additionally, the department is required to provide a statewide hospital association any information it receives from hospitals in the development of the hospital expenditure report.
The department is required to submit the hospital expenditure report to the governor, specified committees of the general assembly, and the medical services board in the department by January 15, 2020, and each year thereafter. The department is also directed to post the hospital expenditure report on the department's website.
The act requires the department, in consultation with the department of public health and environment and the division of insurance, to determine whether the hospital report card and the hospital charge report that exist under current law require any structural or substantive changes. Any such recommendations to that effect are required to be made to the general assembly by November 1, 2019.
Dominick Moreno
Bob Rankin
Health & Insurance
Refer House Bill 19-1001, as amended, to the Committee of the Whole and with a recommendation that it be placed on the consent calendar.
01/16/2019 | House Health & Insurance (10 )
Adopt amendment L.004 (Attachment E) to L.001 (Attachment D).
Adopt amendment L.005 (Attachment F) to L.001 (Attachment D).
Adopt amendment L.007 (Attachment G) to L.001 (Attachment D).
Adopt amendment L.006 (Attachment H) to L.001 (Attachment D).
Adopt amendment L.008 (Attachment I) to L.001 (Attachment D).
Adopt amendment L.009 (Attachment J) to L.001 (Attachment D).
Adopt amendment L.010 (Attachment K) to L.001 (Attachment D).
Adopt amendment L.011 (Attachment L) to L.001 (Attachment D).
Adopt amendment L.001 (Attachment D), as amended.
AMD (L.019)
AMD (C.001)
Amendment Number
Committee/Floor Hearing
L.025
SEN Health & Human Services
Passed*
Lost**
Passed**
HOU Health & Insurance
* Amendments passed in committee are not incorporated into the measure unless adopted by the full House or Senate.
** The status of Second Reading amendments may be subsequently affected by the adoption of an amendment to the Committee of the Whole Report. Refer to the House or Senate Journal for additional information.
03/12/2019 Senate Senate Second Reading Laid Over Daily - No Amendments
03/07/2019 Senate Senate Committee on Health & Human Services Refer Amended - Consent Calendar to Senate Committee of the Whole
01/30/2019 House House Third Reading Laid Over Daily - No Amendments
01/29/2019 House House Second Reading Passed with Amendments - Committee, Floor
01/28/2019 House House Second Reading Laid Over Daily - No Amendments
01/16/2019 House House Committee on Health & Insurance Refer Amended to House Committee of the Whole
01/04/2019 House Introduced In House - Assigned to Health & Insurance
Rep. C. Kennedy
Sen. D. Moreno, Sen. B. Rankin
Rep. J. Arndt, Rep. K. Becker, Rep. A. Benavidez, Rep. S. Bird, Rep. J. Buckner, Rep. B. Buentello, Rep. Y. Caraveo, Rep. J. Coleman, Rep. L. Cutter, Rep. M. Duran, Rep. D. Esgar, Rep. T. Exum, Rep. M. Froelich, Rep. A. Garnett, Rep. S. Gonzales-Gutierrez, Rep. M. Gray, Rep. C. Hansen, Rep. L. Herod, Rep. E. Hooton, Rep. D. Jackson, Rep. S. Jaquez Lewis, Rep. C. Kipp, Rep. T. Kraft-Tharp, Rep. S. Lontine, Rep. J. McCluskie, Rep. J. Melton, Rep. D. Michaelson Jenet, Rep. K. Mullica, Rep. D. Roberts, Rep. J. Singer, Rep. E. Sirota, Rep. M. Snyder, Rep. T. Sullivan, Rep. K. Tipper, Rep. B. Titone, Rep. A. Valdez, Rep. M. Weissman
Sen. J. Bridges, Sen. D. Coram, Sen. L. Court, Sen. J. Danielson, Sen. K. Donovan, Sen. S. Fenberg, Sen. L. Garcia, Sen. J. Ginal, Sen. P. Lee, Sen. B. Pettersen, Sen. R. Rodriguez, Sen. N. Todd, Sen. A. Williams, Sen. F. Winter
Psychology Interjurisdictional Compact
Conflict-free Case Management
Implement St-elevation myocardial infarctions STEMI Task Force Recommendations
Colorado Health Care Resource Book
Substance Use in Colorado - An Increasing Problem, Colorado Health Institution Presentation
Opioid Task Force Duties and Schedule
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Virginius C. Hall Jacobite Collection
A special collection in the Archives and Rare Books Library of the University of Cincinnati
Major Battles
Simon Lord Lovat
Simon Lord Lovat (a title of Scottish reverence) was known in his time as “the Fox,” and for good reason. He was well-known to be sly and duplicitous.Within the context of the Jacobite uprisings, he played a special role. After his execution, it was apparent that it was up to interpretation whether he was a…
May 6, 2019 in Uncategorized.
A Heroine of the Jacobites
Had it not been that her prudence and energies were called forth by the important and critical part which she was instrumental in achieving, she might have lived and died unknown to the world.”
-Alexander Macgregor, The Life of Flora Macdonald
In every piece of history, there is a powerful woman, sometimes hidden or obscured from the…
March 12, 2019 in Uncategorized.
A Jacobite Jukebox: Historical Narratives Preserved in Song
It was hard for me to really conceptualize the true narrative power of song until I was reorganizing the Virginius C. Hall Jacobite Collection this week. As I was arranging a stack of books, I saw one that caught my eye. The spine read: The Scottish Jacobites and Their Songs and Music. Written in 1899…
February 20, 2019 in Uncategorized.
Jacob Here, Jacob There. Jacob Out, Jacobin
By: Sydney Vollmer
A few weeks ago, Kevin walks into my office and tells me that word on the street is people want me to write about the Jacobins. After reading about the difference between Jacobites and the Jacobean Era, some people wanted to know if Jacobins had anything to do with either one of those.…
October 25, 2016 in Uncategorized.
Jacobean-Jacobite? Dated and Confused
Sydney Vollmer, ARB Intern
I was so confused. For weeks, Kevin and I have been talking about the Jacobites. –Before I get into this conversation, it’s extremely important for me to note that neither my grade school nor high school spent very much time on the subject of history. We excelled in language arts, but not…
Notes on Some Jacobite Beheadings
Among the items recently received from the Virginius C. Hall Jacobite Collection in the Archives & Rare Books Library is a watercolor of the “Beheading of the Rebel Lords on Great Tower Hill.” Unfortunately, the image is not one-of-a-kind. It is an incredible work, though. Depicted in this scene is an endless crowd…
University of Cincinnati Archives and Rare Books Library
8th Floor Blegen Library
2602 McMicken Circle
Cincinnati, Ohio 45221-0113
archives@ucmail.uc.edu
Site created & designed by Sydney Vollmer
Content by Kevin Grace
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Be an autor
RUSSELL WESTBROOK 1ST TO AVERAGE TRIPLE-DOUBLE FOR SEASON SINCE OSCAR ROBERTSON
Thunder guard Russell Westbrook has done the remarkable, becoming only the second player in NBA history – and the first in 55 years – to average a triple-double over an entire season.
Westbrook stands alone with Hall of Famer Oscar Robertson, who averaged a triple-double in 1961-62.
Westbrook was averaging 31.8 points (first in the NBA), 10.7 rebounds (10th) and 10.4 assists (third) entering Friday’s game against the Suns, leaving him six assists shy with four outings left to secure the feat. He totaled them by early in the third quarter.
Robertson averaged 30.8 points, 12.5 rebounds and 11.4 assists in ’61-62, setting a standard many considered unreachable in the modern era. (Robertson missed doing it again ’63-64 by just seven boards.)
But with superstar teammate Kevin Durant defecting to Golden State during the offseason, Westbrook had little choice but to put the Thunder on his back.
He has taken full advantage of the opportunity, leading the Thunder to 45 wins and establishing himself as an MVP favorite with one of the great individual seasons in NBA history.
Westbrook will now attempt to break Robertson’s single-season record of 41 triple-doubles, which he matched in Oklahoma City’s victory over the Bucks on April 4. Westbrook has three more opportunities after Friday’s game, a 120-99 loss in which he finished with 23 points, 12 rebounds and eight assists.
lifeprana.com
Philadelphia 76ers @ Boston Celtics (20:00:00 ET)
The First-Half NBA Awards Show
Lonzo Ball Didn’t Exactly Offer A Ringing Endorsement Of Luke Walton After LaVar’s Latest Rant
Los Angeles Clippers vs Milwaukee Bucks (LIVE STREAM)
The TRUTH About The Isaiah Thomas Trade!
NBA TRADE: Paul George to Oklahoma City Thunder for Victor Oladipo, Domantas Sabonis
Toronto Raptors vs Cleveland Cavaliers (LIVE STREAM)
Shaq Says LeBron James Should Join the Warriors to get More Rings than Michael Jordan
Rockets embarrass Spurs in Game 1 Blowout (Video)
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Welcome to my lyrics page. Click on a song title in the track listing to view the lyrics to that song. All songs are off of O-Town's self-titled debut album, which is in stores now (I highly recommend it), with the exception of "One Heart" and "Comin' to the Rescue" which are off of the Pokemon 2000 soundtrack. Enjoy! If you find any errors (their probably is) than please e-mail so I can correct them.
Available at all record stores NOW!!
1. Liquid Dreams
2. Every 6 Seconds
3. Girl
4. Sexiest Woman Alive
5. Love Should Be A Crime
6. Shy Girl
7. All Or Nothing
8. Sensitive
9. The Painter
10. Take Me Under
11. All For Love
12. Baby I Would
Pokemon 2000 Soundtrack
Comin' to the Rescue
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Dates for the Diary
Parish Financial Council
Parish Liturgy Group
Other Parish Groups
Parish Weekly Newsletter
Diocese of Kerry Pastoral Plan
Parish News and Events
Annual Parish Newsletters
., Parish News and Events, Parish Weekly Newsletter
Palm Sunday 9th April 2017
Our weekly News letter
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Parish News and Events, Parish Weekly Newsletter
5th Sunday of Lent 2nd April 2017
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4th Sunday of Lent 26/3/2017
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3rd Sunday of Lent 19/3/17
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2nd Sunday of Lent 12th March 2017
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1st Sunday of Lent 5th March 2017
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7th Sunday in Ordinary Time 19-2-17
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6th Sunday in Ordinary time 12th February 2017
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5th Sunday in Ordinary Time 5th February 2016
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THE PARISH OFFICE,
Bridge Road,
Listowel,
Tel: (068) 21188
Fax: (068) 23655
Email: listowel@dioceseofkerry.ie
Monday to Friday, 10.00am to 5.00pm with lunch-time closing of 1.00pm to 2.00pm.
Masses Time
Monday - Saturday : 10.30am
Saturday : 6.15pm
Sunday : 9.00am & 11.30am.
St. Padre Pio Evening Mass & 1st Friday Evening Mass the first friday of every month: 7.00pm
Dates for the Diary: First Holy Communion 12th May 2018. Confirmation 2018 Friday 13th April at 2pm.
To view our Calender for 2017 click the button below :
Every Saturday immediately after the 10.30am Mass and on the week of a First Friday immediately after the 10.30am Mass on Thursday.
© Copyright - Listowel Parish 2017. Designed by: SJS Web Design
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Entrepreneurs February 24, 2016 March 12, 2016
Mailbird Takes Flight: 1 million customers and counting!
by Liyana Stuart
Andrea Loubier Mailbird
BALI – Liyana Stuart interviews Andrea Loubier, CEO of Mailbird from its office in Silicon Bali and learns its plans for growth, and the importance of ‘cultural fit’. Andrea Loubier, 30, half American, half Filipino, and 100% LadyBoss – is a third culture kid and the CEO of Mailbird.
Born in France, Andrea lived in Kenya, Thailand, and Ohio before Bali. Now she is building an award-winning email client – Mailbird. As of January 2016, Mailbird announced that 1,000,000 email accounts have been activated to date, but Andrea has her eye on millions of people around the world. She calls Mailbird a “Swiss Army Knife for online communication”.
“In the first year, the initial capital of US$100,000 was put in by our co-founders. We bootstrapped off that, for a year, and then we took angel investment and then a couple of bridge rounds. We are making money now,” says Andrea. Annual revenue is currently at US$500,000.
Mailbird has 3 offices – in Bali, Bandung and Copenhagen. Her two other founders – both Danish, and both named Michael, conceived the idea 3 and a half years ago in the US. Michael Bodekaer, Mailbird’s CPO, and has past tech start-up experience in managing, launching, fast coding and product execution. He has been successful growing a startup all the way through exiting and has put the initial bootstrapped investment into Mailbird.
Michael Olsen, Mailbird’s CTO, based in Copenhagen, handles the main machine, the back end development. He improves all the tiny performance details of Mailbird which makes it so lightning fast. Andrea was selected as CEO as she has a marketing background. She is the face of the company and leverages her personal brand to promote Mailbird.
Pricing and customer strategy
Mailbird offers 3 types of pricing – free, US$6 a year or US$19.99 for a lifetime. Yearly subscriptions are the most popular. 20% of unique website views convert to a paid plan. Mailbird has about 500,000 people who have paid for a Mailbird plan. Some of its features include multi-account, integrated messaging apps, a unified email inbox support for 17 languages, and customisation for colours and layout. It’s no wonder that growth has been explosive. Mailbird has a team of 13 staff, including Andrea. Other members of the team include nationalities like Danish, German, Spanish, Brazilian, and Indonesian. Mailbird’s customers are primarily 18 to 34 years old, and mostly men. Most of its customers are from the US or English speaking countries.
A Natural Leader
Inspired by women in tech, Andrea believes in making direct connections to Mailbird customers, and is motivated to make email easier and more effective for people and businesses around the world. Andrea’s background in marketing and project management have also been valuable assets to taking Mailbird to where it is today. Andrea runs Mailbird from Bali, where along with complicated business procedures, there is patchy Internet, legislation is unclear, and power cuts are frequent. These are the basic requirements for many businesses. However, Andrea has persevered and found success.
“What it comes down to is hiring the right people who have great cultural fit with the team, and with no lag time in communication. A lot of people on our team enjoy travelling. Our team is open-minded, creative, with a great work ethic and willingness to learn.”
“Being in Bali makes sense for us. We have a distributed team structure. There is amazing start-up ecosystem here,” she says. Being half Asian and half American has given Andrea a very global, and rare understanding of leading a multi-cultural team. Her people skills are evident. She switches from making fast, impactful decisions, to having the charisma to win over a crowd. People – customers, business associates, and friends alike – seem to love her, and this has impacted Mailbird’s customer base greatly. Mailbird’s customers are not only loyal – they are an elusive breed of superfans. They not only tell other people about Mailbird, they convince them to switch to Mailbird.
Mailbird’s Vision
Mailbird’s vision is to create “the world’s best email solution that is highly secure, fast and innovative”. It has won awards such as “Best Email Client for Windows + Gmail” by IT World, and “Best Free Email Client for Windows” by PC World. It receives glowing reviews from its customers, and has many superfans that promote Mailbird over and over again.
Where does she see it next?
“At some point we want to start looking at artificial intelligence technology to the point Mailbird can schedule meetings for you. There’s a lot of creativity and innovation that can come from managing information online,” she adds. Mailbird’s customer acquisition strategy may also be targeted at more B-to-B customers. “At the moment, we’re very B-to-C,” she says. “What we’re looking at is tapping B-to-B, especially SMEs, and startups as they are more flexible. It’s not our mission to take over corporate clients or take over Outlook, rather provide an alternative option for people.”
“Even a year before we launched I started building relationships with journalists. Our timing was perfect.”
The Right People, and The Right Apps
When it comes to hiring, Andrea says ‘cultural fit’ to the team is very important. “What it comes down to is hiring the right people who have great cultural fit with the team, and with no lag time in communication. A lot of people on our team enjoy travelling. Our team is open-minded, creative, with a great work ethic and willingness to learn.”
How does Andrea manage teams remotely? She recommends different apps and tools such as Time Doctor for managing the team, Asana for task management, and People HR for HR management. “You also need to learn you can’t do everything. Find people that are smarter than you, that are experts in your field.” Andrea has a very thorough process for recruitment, and doesn’t take it lightly.
“The recruiting process takes 5 months, initial screening, interview, and then a skills test. It’s intense. It’s a matter of make it or break it – if you don’t have the right people on board. And then we give them a 3-month probation period.”
Secret to Success
She says the secret to their success is “super followers and supporters” and “hiring people smarter than you”. She has learnt her best lessons from failure, and that character plays an important role in Mailbird’s success. In terms of marketing, naturally, Mailbird depends on online marketing to get subscribers. “We do a lot of content marketing, we do re-marketing, re-targeting. The thing about paid ads is it’s very easy to dump a lot of money into it. It requires constant monitoring and adjustments.”
Media Darling
Part of Mailbird’s success is also due to its media savviness – Mailbird has gotten a lot of media traction, won awards, and Andrea has participated in a competitions to spread the word. For example, she participated in Start-UP, a reality series on Channel NewsAsia which documented the journey of shortlisted start-uppers on a quest to bring their ideas and businesses to fruition with seed funding of $2 million. Andrea started building a foundation for Mailbird’s publicity strategy even before Mailbird launched.
“Even a year before we launched I started building relationships with journalists. Our timing was perfect.” For Mailbird, in-house PR and marketing makes sense. “We tried working with PR firms, but in the end, we know our products better, and it’s better that we do it in in-house. I used to do it all, but now I have someone who helps me with marketing and growth” she says. “We have done a lot of diff marketing tests – and getting press has had the best effect. It’s all about talking to people and building good relationships.”
“We do a lot of content marketing, we do re-marketing, re-targeting. The thing about paid ads is it’s very easy to dump a lot of money into it. It requires constant monitoring and adjustments”
Biggest Challenges
“When you decide to pursue entrepreneurship, there’s a lot of stuff you don’t know. This is the first company I’ve built from the ground-up. You fail, and then you learn to how to do it better,” she says. She stresses the importance of getting feedback from your customers. “I had my general background and we did a lot of testing and got feedback, and all that plays into getting traction. Taking learnings and building a product around those learnings, she adds.
So how does Andrea stay sane? With a large customer base, a distributed team around the world, and the challenges of remote working, she says finding balance is key. “When I started I didn’t have a life. I was working till 2 in the morning, 7 days a week, burnt out …. Once you go through the burnt out phase, you realise you have to figure it out. Now I try to work Mondays to Fridays, 8 to 6. And then I force myself to cut off.”
Andrea stresses the importance of character in building a business. “Character has a lot to do with how far your business can go. I have a lot of really bad days, I have really great days. On very bad days, I think, what can I learn from that?”
And what has she learned from her entrepreneurial journey? “Never give up,” she says with a smile. “Be persistent.”
Andrea Loubier, Mailbird
Liyana Stuart
More from Liyana Stuart
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Liyana is a Co-Founder and Editor of LadyBoss. She is also Co-Founder of Anagram Group, a corporate ... Read Full
Your One-Stop Guide to The Yoga Event of the Year SOULSCAPE 2016
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Posts from the ‘Fiction’ Category
illustration by Meghna Singh Bhadauria
“Ripeti dopo di me. Uno.”
“Tre.”
Ma’am prompted us with her hands as she spoke; like a conductor to an orchestra. But to parrot someone as an adult is embarrassing so a few of us scratched our heads and, with an awkward soft-spoken mumble, trailed off in between. I was one of these people. Sitting at the back of the class, fiddling with pens and looking at the clock, I had no interest in the Italian language. But my father ran a business and dealt with Italy in various woods for furniture. He wanted me to learn Italian and work for the company. I was doing a Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration at the time, and though I could stand in front of a classroom with graphs and statistics projected on a screen, deliver lengthy presentations on market research and finance management, somehow I failed at counting from one to ten in Italian.
But even Hindi and English abandoned me at the dinner table when I tried to tell my father about this failing interest. He was a hulking figure, his belly pressed against the table’s edge, and his upper-lip heavy with a thick handlebar moustache. He loved to eat, and I, under the tutelage of my mother, loved to cook. My mother was sweet outside of the kitchen but with an apron around her waist she was the most stringent guru.
“I want the tomatoes in thin slices,” she used to say threatening me with a slap. “Nahi toh tera gaal banega tomato jaisa,”
Her fiery temper made me a competent chef. My father took his eating seriously. If his phone rang while he ate, he answered only to unleash a torrent of insults at the caller. On most nights I swallowed all apprehension about Italian with my food. I knew he would never let me leave classes at the Centre because, sometimes, in the dinners of dal makhani, rajma, and curd, which I prepared myself, he would slip in the condiment of an Italian phrase.
“Are your classes going well,” he would ask in Italian. I would stare at him.
“Not well enough. Buck up. I want carbonara soon.”
If I ever got a hold of the language I was to serve him a ceremonial bowl of spaghetti carbonara. But whenever my Italian teacher stood me up in class and I had nothing to say, I knew the day would never come.
We continued parroting the numbers.
“Ventisette! Ventotto! Ventinove!”
Not all at the Centre were uninterested in Italian. Zahra was sitting at the front desk with her back straight, hand in the air, jhumkas shimmering as she shouted the numbers. We were not friends but everyone knew she loved Italian. She had often been sighted at the library, with Italian books spread out before her. If others could not answer in class, she leaned in and whispered in their stead. The Centre screened Italian films regularly and she was present for them all, the light flashing across her face, mouth agape as if to consume the sounds and images.
Regardless, it was noon when we were dismissed and I hailed an auto-rickshaw to go home. I was thinking of Zahra with a tinge of jealousy when my phone rang. It was my college friend Prakhar. I clicked my tongue: I had forgotten all about his party; it was later that night. I could not decide if I wanted to go. Prakhar was a good friend but unbearable as a drunk.
“What’s up,” he asked.
“I was at the Centre.”
“Did they teach you ‘hello’ today?”
“Today we learned: go to hell.”
He laughed. “Don’t forget to bring booze tonight.”
“Right, right. I’ll see you there.”
I thought I would make up an excuse later if I decided against going. When I reached home I found my mama, mami, and their six-year-old daughter Archana in the living room. She was an energetic child. Perhaps this was why I found myself trudging up the stairs to my room, with her bouncing up and down ahead of me, pleading to watch television. When my mother told me Archana would be staying with us for three days, I found myself at Prakhar’s party. Everyone was chatting, drink in hand, heads bobbing to music. I was surprised to see Zahra; she was talking with Prakhar. I approached them and she smiled at me.
“Buongiorno,” she said.
“Oh,” Prakhar said. “He’s the one from the Centre. The guy I was talking about.”
“Yeah I know. He’s in my class.”
“Great. Maybe you can teach him some Italian. He doesn’t know any.”
“Don’t mind him,” Zahra said as he stumbled off to speak with others. “It’s great to see you here. You know, I never really got the chance to speak with you. What got you into Italian?”
“My father runs a furniture business that deals with Italy. He wants me to learn Italian. What about you?”
“Oh I’ve always loved Italy. I’ve read too many translated books so I figured it’s time to learn the language.”
“That’s great. You’re learning quick too.”
“Thanks. Let’s sit down? I’ll get another drink.”
She got a beer and we sat on a sofa-bed which had been opened up for everyone.
“What about the Centre itself? Are you having fun?” she asked.
“It’s a great place but I’m not really enjoying the classes. Italian isn’t a passion of mine. I wouldn’t be learning if my father didn’t insist.”
“Oh come on,” she said waving her hand as if at a fly, an annoyance. “Italy has so much to offer: such great theatre, food, architecture, music. You wouldn’t say that if you had a good experience of Italian culture.”
“Have you been there?” I asked.
“I haven’t.”
“I went there with my father, once. But I didn’t see any of those things. What if it’s all just in your head? What if Italy turns out to be different? Would you still love it?”
“You know,” she took a sip of her beer, “I think places are invented.”
“When I was a child I would visit my grandparents in Dehradun and going there meant walks in the hills with my nani and eating cookies with my nana. That’s what Dehradun meant to me. Walks and cookies. Now my nana–nani aren’t there and Dehradun doesn’t feel the same. But not everyone shared my walks and cookies. They saw something else in Dehradun. Those memories are only in my head but that doesn’t make them any less real. It only means my Dehradun is different from other Dehraduns. So why can’t I have my own Italy? I love Italian plays. If I can put Dehradun in a cookie jar then a play is good enough for Rome.”
“And sure there are things to be discovered in places,” she continued. “The Colosseum, the Sistine Chapel; these are things to be discovered, taken in. But places have to be invented too, you know, to be made one’s own. And I have a healthy imagination. Someday I’ll visit Italy. But till then I have my own Italy here,” she tapped her temple. “Reading the plays of Pirandello and Fo in my balcony, ordering pasta late at night, even the time spent at the Centre. Right now, these things are more Italian than Italy itself.”
“Well that’s very convenient,” I said, and she laughed. “But what do I know? All I know about Italian culture is The Godfather.”
Chuckling, she said, “I’ll tell you what. Spend some time at the library with me. I’ll help you revise and lend you some plays. Give Italy a chance.”
“Give your Italy a chance,” I corrected her. She smiled and I smiled back. “Okay.”
We sat in the library, revising what had been taught in class. It was well into the afternoon and our table was next to a window. A beam of sunlight lit Zahra’s face. There were soft, erratic thuds on the window as a wasp buzzed around outside. Several months had passed as we sat together at the library, whispering in Italian to each other. I accompanied Zahra to the films screened at the Centre, too. With her the language seemed less daunting. Even my father seemed less formidable. Most Italian questions asked of me with mouthfuls of aloo and saag were answered to his satisfaction. Even my mother broke into “mera Italy ka tukda,” on seeing my test papers from the Centre come bearing good marks. And when the likes of my relatives came visiting, my father talked of my keen interest in Italian.
My mind had shifted from the lectures and presentations at college to the Centre. No longer was I among the otherwise interested sitting at the back of the class. I was with Zahra, up front, my hand raised in the air. While my Italian was ill–formed and broken, the numbers were child’s play. It was all because of Zahra, sitting in front of me, reading in the sunlight, wasp mindlessly thumping on the window. There can be no pretense: I had fallen in love with her. My determination to learn Italian was just an urgency to impress her. I am convinced that Italian words are incantations in disguise because somehow, along the way, she fell in love with me too. In hindsight it seems like our love for each other was only natural, and like all natural things it grew unbeknownst to us, like a sapling tended to everyday till a bud pops into a flower, and all change becomes apparent.
But even though we were best friends—despite her giggling when I mispronounced words—I was nervous as we sat at the library.
“My father wants me to cook carbonara tonight,” I whispered.
While spaghetti carbonara is quite difficult to cook, the cause of my anxiety was what the occasion really meant: my graduation was approaching fast and I was to be initiated into wood trade. But above all, it was because Zahra and I had decided to tell our parents about each other while things were going well.
“We should get it over with fast,” Zahra had said. “The problem will only fester if we don’t. They should have the chance to adjust.” The problem being religion. Spaghetti and Parmesan made for a delightful combination for my parents but a Hindu and Muslim were best kept apart. I was lost in thought as we got up to leave the library.
“Don’t worry about what they’ll say. Be done with it,” Zahra said. We walked out of the Centre and she hailed a rickshaw. “I’ll tell my parents tonight too.”
She hugged me and kissed me on the cheek.
“Quite,” she said, grinning and I grinned back like a fool. She got on to the rickshaw. “We’ll talk once it’s done. Bye.”
The rickshaw cycled away, bell ringing.
Later that night my father, mother, and I sat at the dinner table with a portion of carbonara on our plates. My father, smiling from ear to ear, put a hand on my shoulder.
“Let’s begin.”
They began eating and my mother beamed at me from across the table, giving me a thumbs-up. I looked at my father just in time to see a noodle being sucked into his still smiling mouth.
“Bellissimo! Appena belissimo! Kya baat hai!”
“Grazie, papa.”
“Such a worthy cook,” my mother said, with a smile.
“Yes. He is doing well all round. When is your graduation, beta?”
“It’s in May.”
“Very well. Graduate, then it’s time to join the business.”
“Yes, papa.”
They continued smiling and resumed eating. I steeled myself.
“Listen, there is something you should know.”
They looked up, still smiling. But I saw the slightest arch in my mother’s brow. She knew something unsavory was to follow.
“It’s about the Centre,” I continued.
“I met someone there. Her name is Zahra.”
The smiles still clung to their faces but had been knocked askew, like a tilted picture frame after a door is slammed shut.
“So what,” my mother said. “Is she the first girl you’ve met?”
“She is my girlfriend.”
My father laughed but my mother was angry. “Arrey don’t fume. It’s alright, beta,” he said. “These things happen at your age. You will grow out of it.”
“What do you mean,” I asked.
“You have young blood. Once you graduate and start working you will enter the real world. There is no space for such things in the real world.”
“I just wanted to let both of you know.”
“Thank you,” my mother snapped.
The rest of the meal was eaten in silence. Once it was over, I washed my hands and went upstairs to call Zahra.
“How did it go,” I asked.
“You first,” she replied.
“Not well,” I said. “Mom was angry but dad just laughed it off. I guess they’re hoping it won’t last. I’ll hear about it a lot but they won’t really interfere.”
“It’s worse with me. They want me to leave you.”
“I’ll just lie to them. Both of them were angry but I made them promise not to pull me from the Centre. I said it was nothing serious and I’ll break it off if they want.”
“Don’t worry about it too much. All this won’t matter when we’re having carbonara in Rome.”
In truth I was quite afraid for what was to come. But I refrained from speaking.
“Yeah,” I said, “things will be good.”
A few years later, with no one but Prakhar in attendance, Zahra and I got married in court. Our families abandoned us. Her parents disowned her when they realised she had gone against their will. They were well into discussions about marriage with another family when she told them the truth. My father, on the other hand, tried to tempt me out of the ordeal with the bribe of a secure future.
“Don’t jump into this ditch. You’ve been working well for the company. You are my son,” he pleaded. “I only want what’s best for you.”
Even my mother had stopped speaking with me. It was years before I heard from her again. But alas be it oak, mahogany, spruce, or ebony, furniture could not entice me to leave Zahra. My father would not have me in the company if I married a Muslim, so I packed my bags, walked out of my parents’ home, and into a one bedroom flat; into uncertainty. I worked as a salesman for a small firm and Zahra worked as a content writer. Spending time together only at night, silent, in stuffy heat under a clacking fan, our relationship was maimed. We hardly saw each other, had little money and even lesser time to entertain thoughts of Italy. Italian was decaying in our minds because we had no use for it; there was no room for it in our cramped apartment. Zahra had stopped reading Italian plays too. All we did was work, eat, watch TV in silence, and sleep. We could no longer afford to think about Italy. Going there seemed like a childish idea.
But each night as I stared at the fan, with Zahra sleeping next to me, facing away, I thought about how I could improve things. Knowing that Italy was too expensive a pursuit, an idea took shape in my mind: if we could not go to Italy, I would bring it to our one bedroom flat. I would invent a cheaper Italy. I decided to cook us a dinner of spaghetti carbonara. Being on a minuscule budget, I replaced pancetta and guanciale with simple sausage. I filled our flat with candles and borrowed an old music system and candelabra from Prakhar. Zahra and I only had a coffee table, so I threw a sheet over it and put the candelabra on top. From the nearest liquor shop I bought cheap red wine. Once the creamy pasta was on the table and the candles lit I played Italian jazz on the music system and waited for Zahra to return from work.
I was going to attempt speaking in Italian for the entire night even though I had not truly mastered it. But it had to be done. Soon enough I heard footsteps outside. The door opened and Zahra stood in the frame, assessing what was happening. She walked towards the table, with a smile. I pulled out her chair.
“Welcome to Italy,” I said. “I made dinner.”
I unveiled the carbonara and she clutched my hand.
“Exquisite,” she said.
“It is?”
“I try best.”
I heaped a good portion of the spaghetti onto her plate and poured the wine. She picked up the fork, prodded the food around, and laughed.
“Hmm, no pancetta.”
“I accuse environment.”
“Accuse environment? Do you mean circumstance?”
“Yes, yes. I accuse circumstance.”
We ate our dinner with the music playing and talked as the candle flames flickered around us. It was quite hot and we had to switch on the fan and lights soon enough. Zahra and I laughed together, and as she held my clammy palm all felt right again. We made love that night after ages and I woke up the next morning feeling like a richer man. Such a success was the venture that we dedicated all Friday nights to Italy: Italian Night. On Italian Night, of course, there was only Italian to be spoken. The food too was never ordered; I cooked it at home. I added lasagna, cannoli, ravioli, and others to the cuisine of our one-bedroom Italy. If the day at work was forgiving we had energy enough to waltz to Italian music too. Sometimes, if I spent a week persuading her, we watched The Godfather on her laptop. But we enacted scenes from Zahra’s favorite Italian plays more often. She would take her favorite lines from Pirandello’s plays and scribble them in Italian because we only had them in English. Then we would jump onto our bed and shout out the dialogues, sometimes to our neighbors’ dismay.
“You know nature is an instrument of the imagination to chase creation at a higher level!”
“Okay but where does all this get us?”
“Nowhere! It only means that one can be born as many things: a tree, a stone, water, a butterfly, a human. But also a fictional character.”
“And so you and those around you are fictional? Only characters?”
“Yes, sir. But no less real.”
One night, while we were in bed, I heard Zahra sigh and turn toward me.
“Listen,” she said.
“Yes,” I replied.
“Promise to hear me out?”
“Things are getting better now but I’m sick of content writing. I have an idea.”
“Let’s open an Italian restaurant.”
There was silence as I took this in. We were indeed improving: the fridge was full of food and the mind empty of anxiety. But why put it all at risk? As I thought about it, I remember wondering what I was most excited about that week. All I could think of was spaghetti carbonara. Italian Night.
“I think we should do it.”
I had come to think of spaghetti carbonara as an old friend. The kitchen was bustling as usual and I was cooking carbonara, my face hot from the day spent in front of the stove, my old backache stinging. Regardless, in the boiling water, the raw spoke-like spaghetti had curled into noodles, and I had already beaten the egg yolks with salt, pepper, and grated Parmesan, into a creamy yellow concoction. I cooked the pasta with sausage and turned off the heat. Soon, I added the creamy sauce to the pasta and put it all into the crockery.
“Have it sent.”
An Italian man had placed the order. He was not the first Italian in our restaurant, and I knew what would happen. I folded my arms and waited. Soon a waiter came into the kitchen, smiling.
“The man would like to see you, sahib.”
I walked out the swinging doors and into the restaurant. It was full and there was a queue outside. Chet Baker’s Romas was playing; a fine choice. I walked towards the Italian man, passing all the posters of Italian architecture, Pirandello, and of course, The Godfather. Zahra and I had hung those posters ourselves when we opened the restaurant.
The Italian was sitting alone at a table for two, right next to a wall; a bright yellow filament bulb was hanging above him. His meal was untouched.
“You asked for the chef, Sir. How may I assist?”
He looked up, smiled, and gestured to the empty seat. “If at all possible I would like a word.”
I sat down.
“I am a chef too,” he said, “from Roma. We are mad for carbonara. So when I saw this on the menu,” he gestured to the food, “Zahra’s Carbonara, I was intrigued.
“No pancetta? No guanciale? I would be fired for doing this in Roma.”
“Do not get me wrong,” he continued. “This is a fine establishment. But why not serve it the real way?”
“Because it is Zahra’s Carbonara, Sir. Zahra is the name of my wife. We were poor when we started the restaurant and could not afford pancetta or guanciale. Only sausage. Soon she would not have it any other way.”
“Ah,” he said. “A tragedy in my opinion. It is to be had with pork. But I understand. Perhaps that is where the restaurant’s name comes from: Italy Second Hand?”
“Quite right, Sir,” I said, as he chuckled. “On some nights we serve it the traditional way as a special.”
“Hmm. Is your wife here?”
“No, sir. She died a few years ago.”
“My apologies. But tell me, have you ever been to Italy? To Roma?”
“Yes. I went with my wife many times. Now my daughter has settled in Sicily.”
“Bellisimo. Maybe you can visit my restaurant in Roma next time.”
“It would have been my pleasure, Sir. But when I go to Italy now I feel like I have left it behind. I don’t think I can go there without my wife.
“Allow me, Sir.” I served him the carbonara. He twirled his fork in the noodles and brought them to his mouth. Looking up at the bulb, he chewed with a thoughtful countenance, and swallowed.
“Hmm,” he said smiling. “Remarkable. Tastes Italian to me.”
Sidharth Singh is a postgraduate student of English literature at Shiv Nadar University. He was a participant at the DumPukht Writers’ Workshop. This is his first publication.
The evening before the Chief Minister comes to the village, the Wonderboy wants to be a normal boy. He is tired of being a Wonderboy. He doesn’t want to sit on a wooden chair, legs dangling because he is too little and the chair too high, a garland of marigold flowers hanging from his neck and a red lotus on his right hand. First, he used to hold a real red lotus. He liked that. About a month ago, a devotee gifted him a beautiful rubber lotus that doesn’t dry out in the heat. He misses the smell of fresh, red lotuses. He hates the smell of crushed marigold petals from his garland because the garland of real marigold flowers is changed every two days. He is tired of instructing his devotees to eat this and eat that, and pray to God by facing the east with wet clothes on to heal diseases. That evening, when the devotees leave, he tells his mother that he wants to jump into the cool pool behind his house and swim like he used to six months ago when things changed in his life. He wants to go fishing. Then he wants to go up the hill in search of pomelos.
His mother says he can’t do that because the Chief Minister is coming the next day to meet him. His father locks the door and his mother threatens to break his legs if he leaves. The village headman is on his way to tell him what to ask from the Chief Minister when he comes to ask for the Wonderboy’s blessings. They will go over the questions together. He will have to remember those questions. When the Chief Minister hears those questions, he will listen to him because he is the Wonderboy.
The Wonderboy doesn’t want to meet the Chief Minister. The entire village is waiting to meet the Chief Minister.
Six months ago, the Wonderboy has a dream. A man with four arms appears in that dream. One of his hands carries a serrated disk that rests on his index finger. The disk spins nonstop in a scary but fascinating way. He is wearing beautiful yellow clothes and lots of jewelry. He also carries a lotus in his other hand but the Wonderboy is just curious about the things he is carrying in his other two hands: a white conch and a gold mace.
“What do you want?” he asks him.
The man with the four hands says, “I want to give you something.”
“I will take it if you tell me how you scratch your back,” he asks the man.
“Like this,” he scratches his hand, passing the lotus from one of his hands to the other that was holding the conch.
The Wonderboy, who is not yet a wonderboy but just a regular boy, protests, “That’s cheating. I asked how you scratch your back.”
He scratches his back. It makes a loud sound, and the room vibrates. That is when the boy knows that this man is really powerful.
Now that his curiosities are quenched, he stares at the serrated spinning disk and feels sleepy in his sleep. He remembers that he is dreaming. The man wakes him up and says, “You have forgotten, I am here to give you a special power.”
“Okay,” the Wonderboy says, and accepts the power. That’s how he is transformed from a regular boy to a Wonderboy who is able to perform miracles : heal diseases, predict the future, but not narrate the past.
When he wakes up, it is late morning and the sun is overhead. His mother is getting ready to work in the fields of the Village Chief. The Chief has a potbelly and he wears a wife-beater. When it is too hot, he pulls the wife- beater to his chest, airing the skin over his rotund belly and walks around scratching it, scolding his employees for being lazy.
The Chief hires a lot of people to work in his endless rice fields. The Wonderboy doesn’t like him at all. His mother gets a basketful of rice in return, for working in the fields for twelve hours, and if his father works, he earns two baskets. Women are paid less than men. She stores the rice in a plastic drum that was used to store plastic colors. She had collected it when the Chief painted his house red a few springs ago. He didn’t want to give it to her at first, but she begged him because she knew she needed an airtight container to store her rice away from cockroaches.
The Wonderboy tells his mother about the dream and his mother starts to cry. She holds his feet, presses her head against them and asks him to wait until she returns and, because she is screaming so much, she attracts a bunch of curious onlookers.
By noon, he is on a wooden chair with arms, a garland of marigold hanging from his neck and a real lotus on his hand. His father tells him that they are playing God-God since God arrived in his dream. If he plays God-God for a few days, he will get to eat porridge and grapes. The boy doesn’t know how that will happen but he trusts his father. The people dress him in a yellow dhoti like the man in the dream. There are several people from the village who come to meet him. They ask him about the dream, but he says, as instructed by his mother and father, that he can’t speak about it. They ask about the medicine he found in the dream and he says, it will cure every disease but he can’t speak about that, either.
He loves the game. Unlike other days, he doesn’t ask his mother to let him go play in the fields with friends where he plays with a large elephant apple because none of them can afford to buy a real rubber ball to kick around. He enjoys the attention of the people who come to meet him every day. He loves to bless them with his right hand just like the priest in the village who usually behaves rudely with him when he asks for a second spoon of porridge. His father tells him it is because they are lower on the caste rung. They will just receive one spoonful of porridge. He has asked him several times not to go to the local prayer hall and beg for porridge. We will eat well here, even if we don’t have enough milk to make porridge, his father says.
But it is too tempting not to go.
Now, he doesn’t have to go in search of porridge. That afternoon, when the same priest comes with his wife with a large pot of porridge, the Wonderboy is startled. They bow to him. They make an offering of fifty rupees and the pot of porridge. As soon as they leave, the Wonderboy looks around for the pot of porridge. He wants the entire pot for himself. He can’t see his mother. He asks for his father. Even he isn’t around. There is a line of people waiting to meet him but he runs to the kitchen, finds the pot, and starts eating from there. When his mother returns, she is angry. She snatches the pot from him and calls him greedy and slaps him hard. He starts to cry. He is loud and won’t stop. It is so awkward.
“The Lord tried to steal porridge!” a devotee announces.
“Did he also try to steal butter?” another woman asks, joining her hands in respect. “The Lord also has human problems because this is his human incarnation.”
His mother is still angry but she controls herself. She can’t lie in front of God and she confesses, “We don’t have butter. We really can’t afford it.”
“Someone please get a bit of butter for the Lord!” a man instructs another man.
The rest of the people gasp in surprise and awe. They are waiting to touch his feet, offer more food, more fruits; the type of grapes he has only ever seen in movies and sweets that he has only seen in the market but has never been able to afford. An old woman says that only the Mother can hit or scold him. This is God’s human drama. He comes to the earth to get love and affection from a mother. Though the mother is human, the God will forgive her because he has chosen her as his mother. She must have fed a lot of poor people in her previous birth, to have this chance to raise a God, slap a God, snatch the pot of porridge from him; another woman remarks, and starts to weep in happiness.
The Wonderboy is angry. Upset, he runs to the bedroom and locks himself in. He thinks he deserves all the porridge—he has earned it for playing God-God all day. It was very boring. Why should he share it with his brother? Why should he share it with the guests who have come uninvited? His mother pleads.
Finally, she says, she will jump in the well if he doesn’t come out. She will also tie a steel pot around her neck before jumping so that she drowns for sure. He unlatches the door, steps out, howling and crying asking her not to die and hugs her. He throws away the steel pot, the only one, in the house. A devotee picks it up to place it in his altar and pray. The steel pot will bring him wealth and good fortune. All the women and men in the courtyard start to sing hymns about the Lord’s mysterious ways and his Human Drama.
“When you don’t obey me, I feel like killing myself,” she says.
Terrified, the boy cries more.
At first, only the locals come for the secret medicine. The Wonderboy climbs the tree in the morning. The tree is in the backyard so he doesn’t have to go far. He chops a bunch and then further chops them into smaller pieces: each of them two inches long. Then he arranges them in groups of four and binds them together with a red thread. The people watch him. They conclude, and spread the news, that the medicine has to be prepared by the God incarnate, otherwise it won’t work.
A man comes from a village that is a bit far away. He asks, will this cure my cancer?
The Wonderboy says it will, because his parents have asked him never to say no. If he believes in it, it will cure cancer. If he wraps it in a cotton cloth with red borders, and wears it around his waist, making sure the chopped wood grazes his skin, it will work. It will cure cancer and diabetes and migraines and infertility because this is what the God has told him. A day later, more people from that village arrive. More people from the neighboring villages arrive. In less than fourteen days, the word spreads to the city and even officers who chase thieves, and teachers who draw government salaries arrive with sick patients. He blesses them all.
The specialty of the Wonderboy is that he doesn’t charge. However, people are free to donate. There is a donation box right in front of his humble abode—a cottage made of bamboo. A man from Dibrugarh, who is fighting many corruption cases associated with his construction company, says that he will donate money for a house and a temple because the Wonderboy cured his mother’s diabetes. He writes a fat cheque. In a day, a politician from far away Dhubri comes for his blessings, and says he will provide all the bricks and cement and iron required to build the house. A few feet away from their house there is a thicket of slim bamboos used to make flutes and hibiscus flowers and other poisonous shrubs that give you rashes. They clear it to construct a new house.
By the end of the month, so many people arrive that the local authorities have to take charge of law and order. They create barricades and employ constables to ensure the people are maintaining the queue. Several unemployed boys from the village set up tea-stalls and betel-nut shops for people standing in the queue for six to seven hours. They tell people about the supernatural powers of the Wonderboy. How on the day of his birthday a massive storm razed the village, blew away every roof of every house, but left his house intact. How they found him playing with a large python one day. How a woman who refused to stop dancing, refused to comb her clothes, refused to stop smearing soil on her body calmed down and fell at his feet asking for forgiveness when she was brought around his energy field.
The Wonderboy is growing tired. Every day, he tells his mother that he won’t play God-God anymore. He has eaten enough porridge and sweets. His mother is horrified. His father is dismayed. She threatens to hit him. She is his mother, and that’s why she can hit him, and punish him, and the real God who has four hands will not punish her. Every night, the Wonderboy cries to sleep because he is tired of this game that his parents are making him play. They had promised that it will get over in a few days and now it has been months. He has to stay home and can’t go out at all.
The Wonderboy has a name. His name is Pitlu Deka and if an eleven-year-old boy may have a girlfriend, her name is Purki Das. She is called Purki because when she was an infant she used to fart a lot after breastfeeding. She is eleven now. She doesn’t fart anymore. But the sound she used to make white farting, purk-purk, has continued to be her name of endearment and shame. Her good name, as in the official name, is Indrani. It is a beautiful name. Indrani is the wife of Indra who is the King of all Gods. He is like an administrator but actually he follows the orders of the Big Gods. There are three Big Gods. One of the Big Gods is that God with four hands and a serrated spinning disk who showed our Wonderboy how he scratches his back.
The Wonderboy is tired of being venerated. He wants to play with Purki. He wants Purki to call him “Hey silly, catch me” and chase her across the field. He wants Purki to appear from nowhere and kick his ass and shout “catch me if you can, stupid” and play catch-me-catch-me for hours, running across the dusty lanes of the village. He is over with porridge and fruits and red grapes and black grapes and apples.
He has put on weight. He is now double the size. When he walks fast, he huffs and puffs. Purki likes him. She plays with him and shares her Mango-bite candy and ripe peaches with him because he doesn’t call her Purki, the name she is ashamed of. He calls her Indrani. One day, in school, he had fought one of his friends who called Purki, purki in front of him. He misses her. He misses going to school. He misses chasing her in the field and then rolling on the hay and stealing mangoes and jackfruits and peaches and myrobalan with her. He doesn’t want these foreign fruits anymore. He wants to swim with her in the Tamulidobha River and catch fish together and wince his face eating raw myrobalan without salt, and then run to drink cold water to feel the sweetness in the mouth.
Perhaps that’s why, on the day the Chief Minister of the state is supposed to visit, he vanishes. The Chief Minister waits; he is so patient and devoted. He is sweating, though it is not really hot. He is used to air-conditioned rooms. He has come with a fleet of cars and an army of soldiers with modern weapons. The cars have sirens and blinking red lights. He is such a faithful believer of God. The entire village is busy with him, Sir-siring him: “Sir this”, “Sir that.”
The night before, the village headman tutors the Wonderboy to talk about building the road, more funds for the school, more money for the prayer hall. Wonderboy, who is tired and upset that his mother has just threatened to break his legs, nods. He is so overwhelmed. His mind wanders off to the plan he has made with Purki the next day.
He isn’t found anywhere in the village, not even in the shallow Tamulidobha River. They find him with Purki in the deep lake in the middle of the forest where no one goes because it is too dangerous. The water in that lake is green. The forest around is full of witches who cook their dinner on the skulls of unmarried men. The village elders suspect he is in the lake’s bed, fighting snakes, to save the village and the world from disaster because that’s what the Lord is supposed to do according to the ancient scriptures. Expert men in the village dive and bring up the bodies. Men suck their teeth and the women weep in a singsong voice, “He was trying to save us from snakes living in the lake.”
Some others suck their teeth and comment that this tragedy is the sign that the apocalypse would come; that the Wonderboy and Purki must have come here so that no one would find them fishing, swimming. The creel and the fishing rod, are on the bank, just next to the German grass that smells terrible when crushed but is a good antiseptic.
When the men in the village lay down the bodies on the flat stone, the women cry. The lake is still dripping away from their sleeping bodies.
God is dead, the Chief Minister exclaims.
Aruni Kashyap is a writer and translator. He is the author of the novel The House With a Thousand Stories (Viking, 2013). He has also translated from Assamese and introduced Indian writer Indira Goswami’s last work of fiction, The Bronze Sword of Thengphakhri Tehsildar, for Zubaan Books (2013). He won the Charles Wallace India Trust Scholarship for Creative Writing to the University of Edinburgh in 2009. His short stories, poems, and essays have appeared or forthcoming in The Oxford Anthology of Writings from Northeast, The Kenyon Review, The New York Times, The Guardian UK, the Hindu, Evergreen Review, Karthika Review, Juked, Sin Fronteras Journal, Stonecoast Review, The Atticus Review, and others. He is an Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Georgia, Athens.
Fiction – Spring 2019
A Different Music
Saira hated Pakistani music. It reminded her of all that was wrong with her country. The male singers were too loud, the women too shrill. But worst of all, it was full of allusions to things she had no clue about – mainly history and literature she had not been taught in school but was expected to know, just because she lived in Pakistan.
Every time she heard dasht-i-tanhaee, she felt inadequate, uneducated. All those Persian words, how was she, being an Urdu-speaking teenager, supposed to understand them? She didn’t even know what her own national anthem meant. She had grown up singing it, thinking it was the high-level Urdu that her parents spoke. It was only recently that she learned it was another language altogether.
Night after night, she watched her parents as they sat with their friends in their living room, listening to ghazals, rewinding them, replaying them, discussing the lyrics into the wee hours of the night. How could they possibly get so much out of something she did not even understand? And this “wah” thing? Whatever.
She wanted to be one of those teenagers she saw on MTV, unburdened by traditional culture. She dreamed of standing on one of those raised platforms in short shorts, dancing to a song she did not know, gyrating to a beat she had never heard.
She longed to be lost in a crowd in which no one recognized her, where her family name meant nothing, where all was acceptable and there was no concept of shame. For in her world everything inevitably came down to honor. What will they think? What will they say? Do you know how many generations we have known their family?
Saira came from an old Lahori family. She had grown up in a house in which her parents, both professors, hosted the city’s literati at regular poetry readings and ghazal mehfils. She remembered their friends sitting beneath the yellow ceiling fan that creaked rhythmically, like an old typewriter clicking away, unnoticed, at its own speed. She could hear their carefully articulated words, the sounds of papers being shuffled as the smell of the motia flowers on the console mingled with the smell of cigar.
When she was younger, she had enjoyed these evenings. Everyone was friendly; if she ever wandered into the living room, she was showered with gifts – books, pens, calligraphy – and attention. She enjoyed the way they all turned to her, listening to her stories and reading her poems. She always said she wanted to be an American rock star; they always smiled.
As the years passed, however, she grew tired of the same routine. It was predictable. It was stagnant. And she just couldn’t understand how they could remain so content in it. She did not want to be like her parents’ friends, in their white chooridars and dupattas. She did not want to spend her life discussing history and politics – political parties without names, just a bunch of initials that all sounded the same. The more time went by, the more it all exasperated her.
Each day, with each milli naghma she watched on PTV, she was convinced that she did not really belong here, that she had been put here by some freak accident and it was a matter of time before she escaped. Her solace came in American music. She listened to Tracy Chapman: “She’s got her ticket, I think she gonna use it, I think she gonna fly away.”
She would sit for hours and transcribe songs like “It’s My Life” and “I Will Survive,” writing down their lyrics so she could sing along with them, standing before the bathroom mirror, using a hairbrush as a mike. And doing so, she would close her eyes and sway – far away from her life, her home and her history.
Saira loved the concerts on MTV. They lifted her spirits. But when she turned to PTV, she saw lifeless women with make-up plastered onto their faces swaying robotically to the beat of an electric organ as the audience looked on with equally vacant looks. She knew that there was just no common ground between the two ways of life. She had to leave.
Maybe if there had been one person, one Pakistani role model she could have looked up to, to want to be like, she would have been motivated to stay. But there was no one. No one Pakistani, that is. On her walls were posters of Tracy Chapman, Cher and Madonna. In the magazines scattered across her room were photo shoots of Caucasian models. On her shelves were books written by Western authors. And in her video player were movies made in Hollywood.
Yes, she admitted to her shell-shocked parents’ friends one evening: she liked John Denver more than Iqbal Bano. She understood him; the lyrics made sense. But more importantly, his songs made her happy. She had heard them call it “hippie music” but she didn’t care. She wanted it, she needed it, she craved it. When everything around her was so intense, so emotionally charged and so tied into history, when she felt the burden of her culture oppressive, it was this music that liberated her.
She started dreaming of the day when she could drive down an American highway in a convertible, the wind blowing in her hair as she listened to “Sunshine On My Shoulders.” She pictured herself, again and again, driving to the nearest McDonald’s and then to a self-serve gas station. How free she would be! She would drink coffee in a paper mug and place it in one of those coffee-mug holders that American cars came with. She would learn to parallel park, she would even put on her safety belt – something her friends had laughed at her for doing in Lahore the first and last time she had ever attempted to do so.
As Saira drove around Lahore in her little gray Cultus, swerving around the potholes and the rickshaws, playing “Country roads, take me home, to the place I belong,” she was convinced that home was elsewhere, certain that she was a traveler who had been away for too long and it was now time to return.
Saira’s infatuation with all things American started a few years earlier during a trip to Orlando. Her cousin Ali, had put her in touch with his sister-in-law who had graciously agreed to host her for the summer. It was her first exposure to America. And she loved it. The roads were so wide, so clean, the people so friendly.
She felt that if she ate American food, drank American water and breathed American air, she would become American. The Doritos, the Lays, the Pringles – this is what gave the Americans their rosy cheeks, their perfectly round buttocks and soft spongy skin. How perfect were their lives, how spotless were their homes. And how much she wanted to be one of them.
On the Fourth of July, Saira had attended a pool party at a neighbor’s house. And she had been mesmerized by the huge, white gleaming kitchen. It had one of those counters in the center, full of fruit so big and juicy she had to touch it to make sure it was real.
There were platters of chips and quiches and mini-pizzas. There were stacks of Styrofoam cups and mammoth-sized bottles of soft drinks, large glass bowls full of punch, and giant tubs overflowing with ice and beer. And the cupboards? They were stocked with more canned goods than many grocery stores back home.
Saira came back to Lahore, after that summer, and, for the first time in her life, noticed her own kitchen. With a gray chips-ka floor and a sticky can of Dalda oil sitting next to an equally sticky gas stove with yet stickier knobs,she felt nauseous. She noticed the shriveled up bananas and the sickly looking apples on her parents’ dining table. She watched the cleaning woman sweep the house with a jharoo made out of tillis, the dust just flying up and resettling on a different object.
More and more, she longed to live in a wooden house with vacuum cleaners and wall-to-wall carpeting. More and more, the cement square she lived in seemed like a prison. She would leave. She would cut her hair, maybe even get bangs. She would chew Wrigley’s Spearmint Gum. And she would never come back.
The first thing Saira noticed about America was the radio. She loved the way it played songs at random. She was so used to playing her tapes in the car that the very idea of listening to music picked by somebody else made her feel free. All of a sudden, something that had always been so planned, so deliberate, became effortless. With each song that came on the radio, Saira was convinced that the universe was speaking to her, giving her messages, hope and advice. She felt important. She felt acknowledged. She felt welcomed.
Less than a year ago, Saira had walked into her parents’ bedroom and found them propped up in their old, four-poster bed, reading their respective newspapers through their professorial specs as the old Sehgal song, Humein to shaam i gham mein kaatni hai zindigi apni, played on the radio. This is the moment that changed her life. Spending her life in a perpetual shaam-i-gham was not what she wanted. And she finally told them so.
Saira’s parents could never have expected the deluge of complaints that followed. She was social, she had topped at the National College of Arts in Interior Design and was now interning with one of the most well-respected architects in the city. Why would she possibly want to leave?
They disagreed with her rationale. But they did not try to stop her. They gave her the money they had saved for her, pulled as many strings as they could to get her a visa and bought her a round-trip ticket, in the hope that she would come back.
And yet the more supportive they became, the more resilient became her resolve. With each friend who came over to wish her luck, with each farewell gift and each “contact number” she was given, she felt she was being guilt-tripped. When her parents’ friends pooled in and bought her a guitar, she cried. But the day she got her visa, she left, not attending the farewell dinner they had spent days arranging. It was simple: the longer she stayed, the more difficult leaving became.
Back in Orlando, the radio was still welcoming, its songs familiar. The streets were as wide and clean as Saira remembered, the homes just as palatial. But Ali’s sister-in-law was a lot less cheery. She had been through a messy divorce in-between. When she learned that Saira was here indefinitely, politely she suggested that Orlando may not be the right place for her.
She had a good friend in New York called Emily, she said, who could help her find a cheap apartment. Saira was taken aback. This is not what she had expected. But there was no other option. She looked at all the “contacts” her family and friends had given her – the last thing she wanted was to get stuck with some old aunty. So she called Emily.
“I have a great studio available immediately,” said Emily. Saira had no idea what a studio was. But it sounded kind of artistic. So she took it. It was only when she reached New York that she learned that a “studio” was a little room with a bed in one corner and a sofa at the other. The kitchen was so tiny, only one person could stand in it at a time, and the bathroom, which faced the inner side of the SoHo buildings, a tiny rectangle of yet tinier white tiles outlined by thin lines of green mold.
Still, she was determined to be positive. Fate had brought her to New York and it was here that she would make her dreams come true. So she started exploring. She liked walking down the streets of the city. She liked the manicure places, the sweet smell of nail polish remover when she walked in. How serenely the women sat as others sculpted their nails. She found a little bagel place in her neighborhood; even the man at the newspaper stand started to recognize her.
New York was not like Orlando. It was crowded, and everyone lived and walked very closely to each other. One day as she sat perched atop a public toilet (one of those stalls separated by plastic walls) this proximity hit her.
She had not seen anyone come in and did not realize how close the women on either side of her were, until they started urinating. It was so loud, she nearly fell off her seat. Back home, she often ran the tap just in case anyone was outside. The thought of anyone hearing her was simply mortifying. But here in America nobody cared. Here, no one was shy. The women peed loudly. Then they walked out, confidently, totally unaffected by the fact that a stranger had just heard their most intimate of bodily functions.
It was one summer morning as Saira stood in front of an ATM machine, squinting her eyes at the balance she saw on the screen, that she realized her lifestyle was not sustainable. She would have to find a job.
She remembered Mark, an under-staffed architect she had met at Emily’s place. She phoned him; he still needed help and agreed to hire her, paying her under the table.
In less than a year, he was willing to sponsor her for a Green Card. How proud her parents would be! She worked hard. She was quiet and polite, pleasant and willing to help others. Everyone at the office adored her. But she couldn’t wait to leave.
For it was in the evenings that she came alive. Saira had learned about the underground music scene through the Village Voice. It was a difficult world to break into, but there was something about her appearance that night – her dark skin, her nose ring and the electric guitar slung around her shoulder as elegantly as a pashmina – that drew Billy to her.
He was buying beer for his friends. She stood at the bar with a club soda in her hand.
“Nice guitar,” he said.
She smiled. “I can sing too.”
They walked over to his friends. And before long, they were practicing together.
Saira loved the smoky rooms, the beat of the drums. She felt at home with these people. They too had rejected the mainstream. They too were trying to express themselves through music. There was Lisa, a tall dark-haired girl with milky white skin; there was Billy, the redhead who played the drums and lived two blocks down from Sara; there was Susan, a 5’10’ Scandinavian photographer with a deep voice and a nose ring, and there was Jay.
Jay was a graphic designer. He had come from Texas six years ago to attend an art school in New York, and had stayed on. He had sandy brown hair, twinkling green eyes and a smile that made her feel special. Like her, he had turned away from his parents’ world. He prided himself on his diverse group of friends and his knowledge of other cultures. He was soft-spoken and reminded Saira of her father, the way he would wrap a shawl around her mother when she was sick.
After their second meeting, the two found themselves completing each other’s sentences. For Jay, Saira was a goddess, dark-skinned and exotic, representing a world that had always fascinated him. For Saira, Jay was an anchor in her new world. He was not like the people at work with their country clubs and houses in the Hamptons. Despite their repeated invitations, Saira had kept her distance – she had not left one stifling community to become part of another. Instead, with Jay she attended foreign film festivals. Together the two composed music and ate Pakistani food with their fingers.
They named their five-member band “The Melting Pot.” The first time they landed a gig, Jay asked his parents to fly down. Billy had negotiated relentlessly for this Friday night slot at the Corner, a trendy club in Greenwich Village where many famous bands had made their first appearance.
That night, the club was abuzz with energy, its low-key façade transformed into a fluorescent entity. Out of the three bands, the Melting Pot was the only newcomer. The music was original, written by Saira and Jay. Between them, they had plotted a throbbing baseline, the sitar twanging and the tambourine adding an effervescent edge which was then picked up by the electric guitar. Their lead song was a composition called the American Dream, a fusion of East and West.
After their second roaring encore, the five of them finally took their bows. Though exhausted, they couldn’t stop smiling. But more excited than them were Jay’s parents, Mr. and Mrs. Sommers, who discussed the evening with as much detail and animation as them, telling Saira again and again in their Southern accents, how precious she was and how she must visit them in Texas. By the end of the night they hugged and kissed everyone like they were long-lost friends.
Saira went home that night, glowing. It was at times like this that she missed her parents the most. She wanted to share her successes with them. She had come so far and made a whole new life for herself; she wanted them to know. But she stopped herself, for she did not know how they would react. Whenever she spoke to them, they sounded subdued on the phone. She was not sure whether she was the cause. So she never asked.
She found out later that her father had developed a serious heart condition and had been confined to bed rest. When he died of a heart attack, Saira was informed immediately. But she could not go back. Her Green Card had not come through. And going back would deny her re-entry into the United States.
Saira locked herself in her apartment. She stopped going to work. She stopped answering phone calls. She felt disoriented, suspended between two worlds. Why was she trying to fit into this world when she already belonged to another one? Why was she trying to leave behind those who had loved her and supported her all her life? She thought of the white sheets that must now cover the floor of her house in Lahore, under the yellow creaking fan. She imagined the incense, the gitaks, the people dressed in white praying on their tasbeehs. She closed her eyes and smelled her mother’s motia on the wooden console. Was it still there?
Sometimes she would wake up and think it was all a dream. She would call her mother to ask her if it was really true? Her mother would cry; Saira would hang up.
Jay began to worry about her. Six weeks passed but she was not snapping out of it. With Thanksgiving coming up, he did not want to leave her alone like this. So he asked her to go with him to Texas. Saira was touched by his offer, and accepted. He was so caring; she would make a special effort, she decided, to be positive. Her regrets were going to have to be something she learned to carry on her own.
At the Sommers’ home in Texas, Saira felt like she had been hit by a whirlwind. There were so many people, so much food and everyone talked so loudly. Being there was overwhelming in every way.
It was an old Victorian home which smelled of cinnamon. There were lace doilies, crystal platters and a kitchen with red gingham curtains trimmed with crochet. The house was filled with baskets of home-baked cookies and every few hours some neighbor would drop by with even more baskets of cookies – it was like something out of an old movie.
She was already worlds away from home. But here she felt even further. Was her mother all alone? Did her friends still come over in the evenings? Did she still listen to her music? Was the old gramophone still in the living room? Stop! She had to snap out of it.
For the first time, since she had landed in America, Saira felt like she was in another country. She watched Jay playfully wrestle with his younger sisters, one in high school and the other at a local community college. It was uncanny how much they resembled each other. Jay rarely spoke about them and yet here they were, almost carbon copies of him, except blonder.
Saira felt like an outsider, looking at somebody else’s life, one that she had believed she was a part of. As she saw him interact with his sisters, his parents and the neighbors who kept dropping in, she noticed the change in his accent. “Y’all jus puhlin’ ma leg!” Was this the real him?
She had always considered him to be an anomaly – detached and independent, a rebel living life on his own terms. Here she realized that he came from a very traditional background. And he was still a part of it.
As per family tradition, Jay carved the Thanksgiving turkey. At the dining table, Jay’s father gave the first toast, and Jay gave the second, thanking and praising his mother for the lavish feast she had prepared. Martha beamed with joy at her son’s toast; she waited all year for such occasions.
Jay must have noticed that Saira had been quiet all evening so, before ending his toast, he did something nobody expected. He added, “And I want to thank Saira, the love of my life, for being here.”
Jay’s mother looked like she had been hit on the head with a steel pipe. She did not finish her food, nor did she smile for the rest of the evening. And when Jay held Saira’s hand at the table, she excused herself and headed for the bathroom.
Weeks later, Saira learned that Martha had cried that night and said to Jay, “There is nothing wrong with her. But she is not like us. Why can’t you find a nice Christian girl instead?”
The day after Thanksgiving, was a day of football and barbeque. Once again, Saira was taken aback when she learned that “football” had nothing to do with kicking a ball around – it was about pushing each other down.
She kept a smile on her face. She listened with amusement to words such as “dead ball” and “drop kick”. What a strange game. It made everyone so aggressive. In between, there was loud hooting and drinking and spitting of beer.
But there was something else going on that Saira did not understand. Jay’s mother, who had been so bubbly and friendly in New York, inviting Sara to Texas, again and again, was different in her own home – polite, at best. She felt the same iciness she had sensed when she had shown up at her cousin’s sister-in-law’s house in Orlando for the second time. The first time, she had been warm and welcoming; the next time, it was almost as if she had a territory to protect.
All of a sudden, Saira felt that her Pakistani-ness was no longer exotic. Jay’s family had accepted her – as a foreigner. And she was okay as long as she was content to remain one. It was when she ventured too close to the heart of the family, the inner circle, that people became uncomfortable. She belonged to another world, one that was nothing like theirs. And no matter how charming or talented she was, at the end of the day she was simply the wrong color.
The day of the barbeque, Martha refused to make eye contact with Saira. When Jay commented on Saira’s cooking skills, Martha smiled, swallowed hard and took a deep breath. Then she mentioned that she had run into Missy, Jay’s high school sweetheart, at the grocery store that morning and invited her for lunch.
When Saira tried to have a conversation with Jay’s family friends, they strained their ears to understand her accent and then spoke back ve-rrry slow-llly, as if talking to a child. When she explained that she was from Pakistan, they smiled politely and blankly, a combination of “uh oh” and “poor you.”
After lunch, Jay’s sisters played country music to which everyone sang along. For the first time since Saira had landed in America, the music felt unfamiliar. As she watched Jay put his arm around his father’s shoulders and passionately belt out songs that she had never heard of, she realized that America was not the cultureless land that she had imagined; it had a very distinct, and in many ways, closed, culture. And she was not a part of it.
Luckily for everyone, Saira’s trip was cut short by a phone call from her office. Mark had received a huge contract and needed her help drafting plans for a 12-story building in five days. Saira was relieved and hopped on the next available flight to New York. Jay was relieved too. He could finally be himself with his family.
When Saira and Jay broke up, so did the Melting Pot. The performances simply did not have the passion and the chemistry they had displayed at the Corner. Saira was irritable; Jay was defensive. She wanted to change some lyrics; he disagreed. Billy tried to hold everyone together but Susan got a modeling contract she was more interested in and Lisa just ran out of patience.
Saira and Billy, still neighbors, remained friends. When he got Saira a contract for her single, the American Dream, she tried to get everybody back on board but nobody was interested. Eventually, she recorded on her own.
Months later, she learned that her single had been released. She was so excited, she called up everyone, wanting to celebrate. But Lisa had a doctor’s appointment. Susan did not answer her phone. And Jay said he had a friend from high school visiting him.
She did not hear from them for the rest of the week. That Friday, Billy brought over some Chinese food. And they sat in her studio, overlooking the dark alley, and ate from the boxes.
“So, what are you going to do now?” asked Billy.
“I’m not sure,” replied Saira.
“Are you going home for New Year’s Eve?”
“Can’t – Green Card still hasn’t come through.”
“How’s work?”
“The usual.”
She was obviously not in a very talkative mood. Billy finished up his lo mein, picked up his fortune cookie and tossed the other one to her.
“Open it!” he smiled.
“Maybe later,” she mumbled.
He shrugged. “I gotta go. Catch you later.”
“Later,” said Saira absentmindedly without getting up. “And, oh, Billy, thanks, for everything.”
The door closed with a thud.
Saira sat transfixed, staring at the window, the fortune cookie in her hand. She was thinking of the farewell party her family friends had planned for her, the one that she had decided to skip. She never even asked if it was ever held.
She looked at the fortune cookie, and then dropped it to the floor, bending down and picking up her guitar.
She held it like a child. And then, with her head resting on the window-pane, her eyes barely open, she started strumming. And she sang, “American dream, you’re not what you seemed.”
Saira had always wanted to be a singer in America. Here she was – with her first single. But no copies had sold here. It was her family and friends back home, her parents’ friends in their white chooridars and their gray cement kitchens, who had gone out and bought the CD.
Ayeda Husain is a longtime journalist (Masters from NYU many a moon ago) who spends her free time writing short stories about Pakistani women, composing and recording meditational music and running a Sufi Center where she teaches Sufi meditation and philosophy.She has lived and worked in Lahore, New York, Vancouver, Dubai and now Oakville, near Toronto, where she is watching her children grow up way too fast.
Sita opened her eyes. “Don’t worry,” I told her. “I’m here.” Sunlight filtered through the curtains. She eventually got off the carpet. We went to work.
Sita still likes to read, even at the supermarket.
“Didn’t you already finish Parable of the Sower?” I asked.
She shrugged.
There isn’t much to do. The supermarket is like a convenience store. It’s inside a strip mall. Like all the other businesses in East Brunswick.
Sita continues to live a few blocks away with her boyfriend. We don’t talk about him when we’re outside the apartment.
Customers appear, mostly teenagers buying packs of potato chips and oversized bottles of soda. Stuff that can give you diabetes.
Sita punches in the purchase, and hands them their change. During our break, she chews on a turkey sandwich.
He made coffee, and asked if we’d like some. I told him “No,” and he raised an eyebrow. Sita quickly answered, “I can take it in the thermos.” He beamed. Sita held a smile.
Mr. Singh told Sita she needed to work an extra shift. He hung up before Sita could reply.
Sita stopped eating her sandwich, and took a deep breath.
When there were customers, I’d help manage the register, and even speak to them, making jokes about the weather, like how the rain was warm like piss. Often, they wouldn’t know how to react. Some would pause and chuckle.
Later that evening, as we returned to the apartment, Sita walked to the closet to get her sleeping bag. The lights were switched off, and she had trouble finding it, even as we dug deeper.
Suddenly, there were footsteps. Sita turned around and froze.
He asked why she was late.
She began to explain, and he interrupted.
Before I could say anything, he edged forward, and muttered how Sita was looking down on him, and putting her job before them. His voice grew louder and louder, until, he stopped, like a switch was flipped off. There was a lull. We held our breath.
I did my best to calm her down, as we lay on the living room floor, tears rolling down her cheeks.
Supermarket.
It was cloudy, and Sita was drinking her third cup of coffee. Customers bought lotto tickets.
Hours plodded on.
A young girl was in the store too. She wore thick-rimmed glasses, and avoided eye contact, but commented that Octavia Butler was her favorite.
At first, Sita didn’t react.
The girl, however, was purchasing a copy of every major newspaper we had. Sita looked up. The girl lowered her gaze.
Soon, more people hovered about, pointing to the tickets. The girl left, getting back into her car and driving away.
The girl bought more newspapers. As Sita popped open the register, the girl asked Sita if she had a favorite part in the book.
The girl was smiling but not looking up.
Sita told her the part she liked, and the girl exclaimed it was her favorite too.
She realized how loud she’d gotten, and became quiet.
Sita didn’t know what else to say. The girl thanked Sita, and rushed out.
“Looks like she’s a student,” Sita said, which wasn’t far-fetched since Rutgers was a few miles away.
“She’s weird,” was my assessment. “As if she can’t speak her mind the way she needs to.”
“She’s young,” Sita said, and went back to reading.
The girl’s name is Afeni. And as Sita guessed, she is a freshman. Her major is in engineering.
She’s originally from Virginia.
Afeni knows plenty about Butler and sci-fi and comic books in general. She even has Grant Morrison’s Animal Man.
Sita asked how Afeni got interested, and Afeni explained that although her parents are computer programmers, they’d always take her to the library as a little girl. Her mom, who now stays and takes care of Afeni’s younger brother, would read bedtime stories every night. Afeni became transfixed by the plots and characters, and oftentimes opted to stay indoors and devour page after page.
Afeni sometimes speaks at a fast pace. She catches herself doing this, and apologizes. Eventually, Afeni also had a series of questions, and Sita answered what she could. For instance, Sita explained that she grew up in East Brunswick, but her parents were from Bangladesh.
At one point, Afeni asked if Sita went to Rutgers too. Sita was hesitant. Afeni saw this, and apologized.
Sita cut her off, however, saying that she had also been to college. In Connecticut. Sita was just a few years older.
I could tell Afeni wanted to know more. Fortunately, Sita said she needed to focus on work.
“She’s a weirdo,” I whispered once Afeni was gone. “Probably doesn’t have any friends.”
Sita didn’t respond.
Oct. 22-23, 2015
Afeni’s favorite Marvel character is Peter Parker. She explained that Parker was nerdy but cool, in his own way. Sita agreed, although adding that Miles Morales was more accessible as a person. Even though there were many who were angry at the change. Afeni joked it was only racists who were upset, and that she probably knew some in her class who were like that.
Sita asked Afeni how she was getting along with other students.
Afeni admitted it was strange to be in settings that were mostly white and Asian, and that even though she was getting the best grades, she continued to feel distant.
Sita encouraged her to be engaged with the curriculum.
Afeni appreciated the advice, and after a short pause, said she didn’t mean to assume Sita had never left East Brunswick.
Sita was cautious. But, she didn’t want Afeni to feel like she did anything too horrible. Sita told Afeni that she attended classes at UConn sometime ago.
I left in my freshman year, Sita said.
I stared. Why was she saying all this? I wondered.
Afeni also looked at Sita’s face.
The next day, they continued their conversation, with Sita standing by the register and Afeni sitting on a stool.
All I know is that my parents think engineering is the best option, she said.
And is that you want too? Sita questioned.
I like work that’s useful, she answered.
“That’s dumb…” I muttered.
Sita made clear that Afeni should keep reading.
Afeni said she didn’t know of any comic book stores in the area, and made do with the campus library’s selection.
Afeni was grateful for the perspective, and said, You’re so wise.
Sita chuckled.
Red and orange leaves were scattered along the road. We discussed which movies to watch for our annual movie marathon.
Customers bought bags of candy. Afeni wore a tweed jacket and had a glowing pen.
I couldn’t find a TARDIS in time, Afeni joked. I’ll be going to a party tonight to show off what I have, she added.
Sita smiled. They went to the Chinese restaurant next door for some General Tso’s.
While in the apartment, Sita kept smiling as she undressed. Even when brushing our teeth, she couldn’t stop.
However, the voice boomed.
The bedroom was shrouded in shadows.
Immediately, her throat was dry.
She closed her eyes. But could feel him next to her, his body pushing hers against the wall.
Do you even care about me? he said, If you leave me, I’ll kill myself.
She dropped her brush, and went to the living room, where she slid into her sleeping bag, and zipped up.
“Let’s pick a movie,” I said.
Her fists were clenched. Her breathing was shallow.
I offered some choices on what we could watch.
Every time, he’d apologize. Every time, he’d place a hand on her back, and rub counterclockwise.
“No one knows me like you do,” he’d say, which was true to an extent. After all, Sita and he were friends since elementary school and after what happened to Sita at UConn and when she returned, he was there, ready to welcome her.
I was always mixed-up about him. Sometimes, he was entertaining. In other moments, he was lost in his own swamp of thoughts, angry at his parents, his friends, at everyone he said he couldn’t trust anymore.
“I need you, babe,” he whispered, his hand feeling warm and moist. “I need you…”
In the afternoon, we were in the supermarket.
Went to supermarket. Later came back to the apartment.
Went to the supermarket. No Afeni.
No Afeni.
It was our day off.
“Want to stay in and watch a movie?”
Sita rolled up the sleeping bag, and proceeded to wash dishes and clean the apartment.
She took a break at noon. Dust bunnies were everywhere, to be honest, but I didn’t utter a word, as Sita sat on the couch and clasped her hands on her lap. She yawned.
I repeated we should watch something.
“Why?” Sita murmured.
“Why what?”
“Why did I stay?”
“Let’s not. You had a bad experience, and no one believed you, and this was just expected.”
“But…it was the same thing…”
“We should definitely watch Star Wars. That should be fun!”
Sita was quiet.
“Star Wars! Star Wars! Star Wars!” I chanted and put it on, with the volume turned low.
I was relieved we could relax. For the first time in a while, though, I couldn’t tell what was on Sita’s mind. I asked her half-way through the movie if she was hungry, and she suggested I get some rest.
“Besides,” Sita said, “you’ve done plenty.”
Sita and I handled the customers, and a new shipment of eggs. Sita even arranged the bags of potato chips, so that the list of ingredients would be facing the aisle.
During lunch, as we made plans about which movie was next on our list, Sita noticed someone sitting on the curb.
It was Afeni.
Without hesitation, Sita rushed outside, and asked Afeni how long she’d been there.
Afeni murmured. I repeated the question and instead of speaking with clarity, she looked up, her face wet.
Sita led Afeni into the store, and locked the door. She gave Afeni bottled water and wanted to know exactly what happened.
Afeni’s hands trembled.
At the Halloween party, she said, a friend grabbed her. He was someone she’d been studying with all semester. He wanted her to dance, and placed his hands on her hips, despite her telling him not to. He laughed, and got closer.
“I told him that I wasn’t interested, and he started to curse at me,” Afeni said, stammering. He called her a black bitch, and she pushed him away. Everyone blamed her for making a scene.
Sita clenched her fists, and told Afeni she could stay with us.
At the apartment, Sita gave Afeni the sleeping bag, and Afeni lay down, and shut her eyes. She woke up in the middle of the night, and saw Sita also on the ground.
Afeni asked why she wasn’t in her own bed.
Sita didn’t reply and Afeni stopped asking questions.
Afeni is in Virginia.
Sita cleaned the hallway, and bathroom.
We drove through East Brunswick.
Central New Jersey, Sita described, as diverse but can feel like one giant suburb with random racists sprinkled in.
Afeni laughed, as Sita pointed out the nicer parts where one can find a decent Afghan or Jamaican spot to eat at. Most of the county, however, were boxed houses, shopping malls, and strip clubs. Fortunately, Sita knew where we were.
“Turn here,” she said, as Afeni drove onto a narrow road.
Even I didn’t know where we were heading, although the mobile homes looked familiar.
We reached an empty parking-lot, where there were hardware stores and laundromats nearby.
It was Afeni who squealed and made me realize there was also a comic book store tucked between them. Afeni ran inside.
We spent the remainder of our day perusing the aisles, carefully picking up comic books wrapped in plastic sheets.
Personally, I was losing interest and was ready to leave, but I suppose it was nice to see Sita and Afeni in their element.
Sita asked Afeni, who was grabbing every new Miss Marvel she could find, if there was anything in particular they should look for.
Afeni said she had got most of what she wanted but she was interested to know if the graphic novelization of Kindred was available.
Sita went to the front desk to ask.
The person at the register was a man on his laptop.
“I don’t know what that is…” he said, clicking on his mouse.
Sita arched an eyebrow, and waited, as if maybe the rest of what she said hadn’t yet sunk in.
“So…can you look it up?” she eventually said.
“Look what up?” the man replied, eyelids half-open.
“What’s happening?” Afeni said in a low voice. The man looked up from his screen.
Afeni clutched the comics to her chest. He stared and smirked.
Sita stepped between them.
I moved to the side to give her more room.
“We would like to speak to your manager,” Sita said.
The man chuckled and returned to his laptop.
I wanted to tell Sita to be calm.
I wanted her to be happy, wear a smile, and remember that she was on an outing.
Sita’s veins throbbed, as she started to walk away. Afeni decided to place the comic books on the counter. Once she got close enough, the man placed his hand on hers.
Sita’s eyes widened. She punched him in the nose.
He tumbled.
Sita and Afeni hopped into the car and drove off. Sita glanced in the rearview, spotting the man staggering after them. He dwindled into the distance.
They stopped at a Dunkin Donuts and remained inside the car, watching trucks and vans along Route 18, buzzing past like brushstrokes.
Sita was the first to speak.
“You can’t let anyone push you around,” she said. “If you let one person get the better of you, it never ends.”
Afeni didn’t speak. The sky was peppered with stars.
Afeni dropped Sita off at her apartment, and Sita invited her in.
Afeni politely refused and said she’d see her soon anyway, and left.
Sita didn’t talk to me the entire evening.
Afeni showed up today, even though I said she wouldn’t.
She didn’t say much but spent time sitting and watching Sita work the register.
When day turned to night, Afeni simply went to her car and drove away.
Sita told me to stay home and rest today.
She went to the store and met Afeni.
For the first few hours, it was the same as usual.
Afeni on her stool. Sita at the counter.
Right before lunch, when the store was crowded, Afeni asked Sita how she was feeling.
That isn’t true. It wasn’t before lunch, and the store was empty.
I didn’t know what she meant.
Afeni said I had bags under my eyes all the time and that I looked skinnier each day. She said my sweaters hung from me.
I still didn’t know what to say.
So I resumed counting the nickels and dimes.
Afeni said she got to know students at an organization dealing in social justice.
I was glad. I told her to be careful though.
In the afternoon, Afeni asked if I was getting enough rest.
I said I was okay, and that my shift was almost over.
Afeni paused.
“I’m worried about you,” she said.
I chuckled.
Afeni was finished with her final exams, and was going back to Virginia.
She said she’d return mid-January.
I told her to drive safe.
She hugged me while we were in the parking-lot.
I watched her disappear into the traffic and a few minutes later, I too left.
I took the day off and cleaned some more.
The bed felt hard.
Sudip Bhattacharya is a doctoral student in Political Science at Rutgers University, where he researches on race, class and gender and social justice. With also a Master’s in Journalism from Georgetown University, he has written for CNN Politics, the Washington City Paper, Lancaster Newspapers, The Daily Gazette in Schenectady, The Jersey Journal, The Aerogram, Media Diversified (Writers of Colour), Reappropriate, The New Engagement, and AsAm News. Finally, he is a democratic socialist, a believer in having hope (but not in an annoying way), and an activist/organizer learning from the amazing people around him.
Zahida
Zahida Begum of Sohnipat, Haryana, Hindustan, remembered distinctly her name, even recognized faces as well as anyone could, but sometimes forgot that her husband was dead. Other times, she forgot she ever even had a husband. Last summer, when she began waking up before the sun and the muezzin-and certainly not to pray Fajr-one could not tell if, on any particular day, Zahida had woken up with the memory of a dead or alive husband, or whether there was any memory of him at all.
It was Zahida’s caretaker who was perhaps the most adept at identifying what the deceased husband’s status would be on a chosen day; nights of staying awake with the old lady and arguing in the early mornings over cups of chai had honed her skills to perfection. Still, it was not purely a guessing game-Zahida was quite generous with hints. On days the husband had been resurrected by Zahida, she would ask for breakfast to be served to two people instead of one. All went as normal on the mornings that the husband was understood to be laid to rest. But the worst mornings befell the four walls of Sarwar Road 305, Lahore, Pakistan, 56000, when Zahida remembered neither the life nor death of a husband, and instead thought of herself as an eligible, single woman. On these occasions, the breakfast was instructed to be served to the suitors who had come with the intent of asking Zahida’s hand in marriage and whom Zahida greatly wished to please.
Even though the old lady really tested her patience sometimes, especially when she woke up at 3 a.m. and asked for chai, the young caretaker tried not to complain. She liked her job; it was better than any other place she had worked before. There was plenty of free time for her to watch TV and talk on the phone when Zahida was knocked out on sleeping pills. Zahida’s daughter, who was the actual employer, was good to her for the most part. She was also allowed to sleep till late in the daytime following Zahida’s hard nights. It was a good situation, for the most part, and the caretaker was bent on making it work.
Zahida, however, was often irked by how little the young woman understood or cared about the differences in their respective positions in the household. A mere servant-girl telling Zahida she was wrong was too strong a blow to be endured by anyone of her stature. After all, her father had been a jailer, who knew how to put these chotay log in their place, and she was a jailer-ki-beti with enough experience to not be fooled by the likes of the young woman.
The caretaker had been with Zahida for four years when Zaheeda’s husband, Hassan first began to slip from her memory. It was she who had first noticed that forgetting the husband was becoming a frequent occurrence. When Zahida asked if the husband was fed breakfast the first few times, the caretaker thought she was alluding to the daughter’s husband, and answered in the affirmative. It was only when she asked the caretaker to leave the room for the night to give Zahida and her husband some privacy, that the caretaker realized what was going on.
Zahida was adamant that night that the caretaker could not sleep in the room. Besharam, she called her. Why wouldn’t she leave? Baffled, the caretaker had left to give Zahida enough time to fall asleep before she could sneak in again. After the two-hour mark, and endless games of Candy Crush, the caretaker decided it was safe to return. She found Zahida sitting on her bed, fire in her eyes. It seemed as if the husband had never come. Churail! Zahida hurled her TV remote at the caretaker and missed, and continued her verbal onslaught. It seemed that Zahida suspected the caretaker had something to do with the husband standing her up-for she was young, and Zahida an old lady. The caretaker had no choice but to sleep outside that night.
No one really knew what was wrong with Zahida. The closest diagnosis the doctors gave was some form of dementia, but emphasized that her symptoms still did not quite fit the usual description since Zahida remembered everything and everyone, just no longer knew where everything was in her timeline. All anyone knew was that, one random day, Zahida had woken up and stopped praying. Then, she had claimed that one of her sons-in-law was having an affair, but did not name any names. Her daughters were all on edge that week, in fear that Zahida would name their respective husbands. It was only when Zahida slapped her assumedly favorite daughter that the realization suddenly dawned upon everyone that Zahida could not have been in the right headspace to do such a thing.
It was soon after this incident that Zahida had begun waking up before the sun and the muezzin, but still unabashedly skipped her prayers. It was only a couple of days later when the husband was brought back to life.
Her daughters tried to get Zahida to pray again for they felt, practically, that it would bring some routine back to Zahida’s life, but, secretly, that Allah would fix everything. They would subtly remind her when the azaan went off, or make it a point to announce that they were going off to pray. But, Zahida took to nothing. If she was asked whether she had offered her prayers, she would simply answer in the affirmative, and no one really knew how to respond to that. Just like no one knew how to respond to her when she said that her husband was alive. No one had it in them to break the news of death every day, not even the caretaker.
Zahida had not always lived with her daughter and her family. It was a few years after Hasan’s death that she was left with no choice but to move in with her eldest daughter. The new town was starkly different from the one she was accustomed to, with its neatly laid out roads and beautifully painted houses. But, Zahida barely left the house, and the four walls of a room all began to look the same if you waited long enough.
Zahida was given her own private room with an ensuite bathroom. It comforted her to know she would still be able to retain her privacy. The caretaker was hired specifically for Zahida, and slept in the room with the old lady to assist with any bathroom trips during the night-her bad knees no longer allowed her to get up or walk by herself. It was the knees that had forced Zahida to sell her quaint house in Iqbal Town, and move to her daughter’s, all the way across the city, in the first place. The doctors declared that a knee transplant would be difficult to recover from, considering her weight and age. They let the family know they were sorry they could not do more, but that these were going to be the knees Zahida died with.
Everyone knew why the house was really sold: there was no money to pay for Zahida’s cataract operations, which could be avoided no longer. Despite the grandchildren’s clamoring anger and Zahida’s breaking heart, the house was sold. After all, her eyes were more important than her heart; they allowed her to see instead of feel, and the code of conduct for widows clearly stated that feeling was a task that Zahida could no longer have the privilege of worrying about.
Right after Zahida moved out, the buyers tore down the little house with the green gate to rebuild it. It came as no surprise to anyone that the house had simply refused to exist without Zahida. Many had left before; the husband, her daughters, the servants who came and went, but the lady of the house had always been there; preparing feasts, hosting guests, fighting with her husband, and watching TV. With her finally leaving, the house had no reason to stay, and it, too, disappeared, never to be found again.
In the years following her husband’s death, before she had to move in with her daughter, Zahida had gone on living as usual in her little house in Iqbal Town with, of course, the companionship of a domestic servant. It was during those years as a newly-widowed woman that she once again began to lament the absence of a son; if she had a son, she would be able to live with him. She would no longer have to make ends meet. No more trips to the grocery stores on rickshaws. A widow’s pension could only afford her so much at the end of the day.
The son would, as custom quite strictly dictated, take care of his mother in her old age. And a widowed mother? There was no question of what the code of conduct for sons said about a son’s responsibility in the matter. But, Allah had given her four daughters instead, and for any son-less exceptions such as this particular instance, custom was, of course, silent.
Naturally, the son-less Zahida had to default to her daughters: when the time came, the eldest daughter took up the responsibility, and cleared out a room for Zahida in her own home. The irony of the situation was not lost on Zahida for she could never have imagined living in one of her daughters’ houses, as a dependent on any one son-in-law-whom she did indeed love more than her daughters, for they were the sons she never had. But, to live in someone else’s house! A daughter’s! An unimaginable thought! And, suddenly, Zahida’s new reality.
The first few years at her daughter’s were plagued by inept eyes and failing knees, slips in the bathroom, and a burning longing for her home that could never be snuffed out. Zahida was comfortable in the roles she had to play in the house. She was an excellent widow, an even better grandmother, and an appraised mother and mother-in-law. She had to admit, however, that she missed being a homemaker-not wife, never wife, but, homemaker-which she saw as the highest position of authority one could hold.
It was true that Zahida, in her married days, exercised a great degree of independence in running her own household, which is also why the possibility of being demoted to a secondary matriarch in one of her daughters’ houses terrified her. Her husband had never interfered in matters of the house, and she in his, and the couple had both preferred it to be that way. In fact, the couple liked to stay out of each other’s way so much that they had separate bedrooms-the husband moved upstairs-as soon as the daughters were all married off.
Zahida’s marriage itself had only been as good as any arranged marriages can be or any marriage really. They shared the usual incompatibility and divergence of interests; she was a domestic at heart who enjoyed cooking, being around her family, and having her husband come straight home from work in the evening. Her husband, on the other hand, was more a socialite than he ever was a banker. He mostly shared his evening cup of tea with high society- top Lollywood movie stars and singers among the lot-while Zahida simply took her evening cup in the comfort of her lounge. His evening cups of tea became the bane of Zahida’s existence, and hers, the only sustenance. They both knew well that the elite school educated man was rather ill-suited for his simpleton wife from Krishanagar.
Although a loyal husband, Zahida’s husband enjoyed the company of females-in a strictly platonic way, of course-and that irritated Zahida who, although perfect in all other accounts, was an inherently suspicious partner. It was for this reason that she liked for her husband to come home right after work; any later and the two were certain to fight that night. This particular side of Zahida, however, was restricted to her husband and her four daughters. And, the help, of course.
The sole financer and benefactor of his wife and four daughters, Zahida’s husband was naturally responsible for making all decisions that members of society had collectively ordained as important. So, while he was the one who chose, rather arbitrarily, eligible suitors for his four daughters, Zahida was the sole and masterful architect of the trolley of chai items that the suitor’s family would be greeted with upon their arrival.
As it happened, the chai trolley played a rather significant role in the matchmaking business, even more so than the girl in question being married. It was a known fact that the suitor’s family had only a window of time where the girl serves tea to them to confer judgment about her character, and time permitting, about her suitability-to the boy, yes. But the family she would marry into must also be a good fit. That was equally important, if not more.
The art of putting together an appropriate chai trolley for such occasions was one that was perhaps dying with Zahida’s generation, she thought. Even her daughters did not care to learn. Zahida maintained that to create a successful chai trolley, one had to have the right balance between home-cooked items, to demonstrate domestic prowess of course, and store-bought bakery items, which signified a degree of affluence. The chai itself, the indubitable showstopper, must also be the right color; enough milk to indicate an ease with use of milk, but not so much that the other person concluded that the art of chai-making was being undermined.
A great connoisseur of chai herself-devouring her morning and evening cups as promptly as clockwork, Zahida took pride in the tea ranks of her household, and, so, did not concern herself with any feelings of insecurity on that front. But, ever since her eldest daughter’s engagement broke off, Zahida knew her tea alone would no longer suffice to overcome the abiding stain of a called-off engagement. It was fortune’s blessing, and her daughters’ luck, that Zahida had her unparalleled amiability to fall back on. The husband found the matches, but it was always Zahida who sealed the deal with her pure Hindustani behaviour, the kind one could not find easily anymore.
Zahida found praise quickly wherever she went. Acclaim for her hospitable nature reverberated from Krishanagar to Iqbal Town; not a single person who made her acquaintance could help but acknowledge her good-natured disposition.
She had never spoken to her husband before they married, but all of her husband’s friends and family raved about her to the young groom. She has authentic Hindustani tehzeeb, they said. Zahida’s father-in-law was especially taken by her, much to the dislike of her sisters-in-law.
“Jadoo” he would endearingly call her, “Now I understand why they call you Krishanabad.” And, the new bride could not help but smile at the sound of it.
Krishanabad roughly translated to ‘cultivator of Krishan’, and was used to say, in a more poetic yet complicated way, that, growing up, Zahida was the soul of Krishanagar, her hometown. Her mother despised the title, for she thought it brought too much attention to the young, beautiful girl, but Zahida wore it proudly, just as she wore her thick hair in a meticulously done braid that reached all the way down to her hips.
When, a few years after the Great Partition, her hometown was officially renamed Islampura, for reasons beyond Zahida’s comprehension, it was thought, at least in her household and especially in Zahida’s mind, that Zahida’s nickname alone kept the town’s essence alive.
Following the name change, there were some, like Zahida, for whom it was still the land of Krishna, the Hindu God, just as Hindustan was still the homeland for those, who like Zahida’s family, had migrated to the other side. Others did not seem to care what the town was called, but some cared too much, and were intent on calling it Islampura-the city of Islam- as a reminder to everyone that all the land on this side of the border had converted, willingly or not, to a new religion. Zahida’s uncle, who was a poet and an intellectual-which was just another way of saying unemployed-laughed uncontrollably when they announced the name change:
“They wanted to get rid of the Hindu-ness of the town, but little do they know that ‘pura’ is of Vedic origin too.”
He laughed and laughed, all the while penning some vulgar couplets about it that he would divulge to the shopkeepers at his evening strolls through the Bazaar. He let Zahida in on the ones most appropriate for young girls, and Zahida laughed with him-on the couplets, of course-even though she neither knew what pura was nor understood what Vedic meant.
Zahida only knew that the old man, who appeared on the corner of Bheem Road a year before the name change and had stayed there since, told the story of the name change better than anyone else; gesticulating with his arms stretched, he narrated the story of giant masses of people reciting the Kalamah and declaring their faith in one God and His prophet. Zahida had once seen him tell the story on her trip to the bazaar.
When he spoke of the weeping Hindu Gods who, betrayed by their own newly-converted lands, had to leave behind everything and migrate to the other side-the Hindu side-the storyteller attempted an exaggerated, thunderous wail that made the neighborhood kids laugh so much they let him have their daily allowance, a few coins in total. Zahida liked that the storyteller had no qualms accepting the children’s money, for storytelling was his bread and butter, and she liked that he acknowledged her with a slight nod of the head every time they crossed paths.
The story of the weeping Hindu Gods always took place in the temple that was rumored to have existed all the way down on Pando Street, but which no one had ever found any evidence for. According to the storyteller, the temple had collapsed under the burgeoning grief of the Gods, never to be found again.
One day, the storyteller died. No one had even noticed he was missing until, one day, in the children of the neighborhood had set out in search of him , their coins clunking against each other in their drenched muslin pockets, ready to be exchanged for stories.
The storyteller was eventually found dead in an alley, soaking and unbothered, not too far away from Zahida’s house. It was after his death that a lot of people found out that he had no family; stories about the storyteller’s origin were all anyone talked about for exactly one week. Some suggested he had been separated from his family during the partition, and had slept and eaten at a nearby shrine of a saint. Someone who referred to himself as the storyteller’s friend, whom no one had ever seen before the funeral, maintained that the storyteller was, in fact, from a very rich and reputable family of Lahore, but no one believed him. Even Zahida didn’t believe this when she heard it, for everyone knew that men who told stories on the streets could not be from reputable families.
The storyteller’s funeral was held at Baba Ground and was well-attended. The kids-his faithful audience-showed up. Zahida did not go, for young women were not allowed to frequent funerals. That, too, of strange, story-telling men. Her older brothers went. She wanted to know if the Hindu Gods had attended the funeral but was too embarrassed to ask them.
Soon, the town moved on; the kids were on to newer acts and antics-there was a magician who made a coin appear from their noses, and the town stopped caring about the origins of the storyteller. It was during those days that Zahida became certain there were some things she knew better than others, and this was definitely one of them: the shelf-life of the dead was shorter than any other item in this world, and would not last, even a single day, on her chai trolley. It expired immediately, and Zahida knew that if it was not thrown out, it would quickly begin to stink up the place.
Even decades after the Partition, when Zahida had gone from a young girl to a grandmother, she would often narrate the story of the weeping Gods to her grandchildren-without the wail, of course-who, fascinated, spent hot summer evenings on the streets of Krishanagar in search of the hidden temple. Zahida indulged them even though she knew the temple was never to be found again. And, every time Zahida told the story, she thought of the poor storyteller who had died quietly, under the pelting monsoon downpour of Lahore. Zahida was amenable to the idea of dying quietly, but feared the possibility of being remembered only fleetingly.
This was why every time someone in her life passed away-the first significant loss being that of her mother-Zahida always thought of the storyteller who was only mourned for one short week. It terrified her to think that mourning adequately, too, was an art that would eventually die with her. Throughout her life, Zahida mourned each loss with relentless grief. She was only fourteen when her mother passed away, but, even then, Zahida made sure her the memory of her death was an oil lamp that never went out. Especially in her old age, Zahida had had to mourn a significant amount as people around her passed onto the next life, and, truthfully, sometimes she got tired of it.
When her husband died, Zahida did not feel the magnitude of loss that people wanted her to feel. Still, she mourned in the manner that best suited a wife. Zahida made sure all rites of death were honored. She made certain that she was following all the widow laws of mourning. She cried at every mention of the husband, even if she did not want to. In fact, sometimes, she even wailed, if the occasion demanded it. She remained in the house to complete the required period of iddat. She wore dull colors, and no lipstick. She visited the graveyard every week, and fulfilled all the religious requirements for death anniversaries.
Now, in her husband-forgetting days, seventy years had passed since the Partition. Zahida remembered Sohnipat more than Krishanagar on some days and Krishanagar more than Sohnipat on others, and often reversed and un-reversed the Partition as per her whim. It was these places she would ask to be taken to in her phases of outburst. The daughters drove her around aimlessly, making excuse one after another, about why it was taking so long. They waited until the medicine kicked in and drove her back to Sarwar Road.
Zahida had little sense of time now; she would ask to eat breakfast at three in the morning, sleep through the day, and stay up all night talking to a growing list of dead visitors- many whose funerals Zahida had attended, many of whom she had appropriately mourned. Of course, she still retained her second-nature hospitality, and asked for an impressive breakfast to be served to her empty room of guests.
The caretaker indulged Zahida as much she possibly could, but everything spiraled out of control when, one day, in the middle of the night, Zahida flung the AC remote at the caretaker. The caretaker thought maybe Zahida needed to go to the bathroom, and quickly got up to put on the lights. When she turned around, she witnessed Zahida’s face rabid with anger. ‘Randi aurat’ were the first words Zahida spoke before the glass of water came straight at the caretaker, but only made it halfway through the room before it splattered on the carpet.
Zahida was arguing with someone that the caretaker obviously could not see; it seemed that the husband was alive on this particular day. It turned out that Zahida was angry at her husband because she, once again, suspected him of cheating on her with the caretaker. She maligned the caretaker’s character in words that rung in the mind of anyone who heard them.
Fights with the husband, and, consequently, attacks on the caretaker became a regular feat in the house. The caretaker was barred from entering the room when her suspicions flared up. The husband was screamed at; she spoke through gritted teeth, always directing her anger at the ceiling as if the husband still lived upstairs, and talked about all the women she had, in the course of their marriage, suspected of having an affair with her husband. Sometimes, to make headway in her fight, Zahida would even start hitting herself.
Zahida’s daughter tried to calm her down during her episodes, but nothing worked in her phases of rage-filled outbursts. If she was offered medicine, she would accuse the offered, no matter who it was, of trying to kill her. She took the pills and tossed them across the room. The caretaker was left with no choice but to dissolve the medicine in Zahida’s chai. Soon, Zahida picked up on that as well, and refused all food and drink. The family eventually realized there was nothing they could do but wait for her to tire herself out.
Naturally, the caretaker got tired of the everyday hassle, packed her bags, and left. Zahida’s daughter begged her to stay; she offered to double her salary, give her longer vacations, whatever she needed, but the caretaker could not be persuaded. . She knew Zahida’s situation would only get worse from here on. She expressed how selfish and sorry she felt, but that she could not retract her decision and that it was best for all parties involved that someone else be hired for Zahida.
Zahida remained unaffected by the change. As long as someone helped her to the bathroom, she was fine without having to worry about that dirty, husband-seducing tramp. When her daughters tried to talk to her about her unacceptable behavior, Zahida knew that they would never understand. And, so, she sat there-with or without the caretaker-hosting conversations with guests that had come exclusively to see her. To drink chai with her and to keep her company. Guests she hadn’t seen in quite a while and with whom Zahida had a lot of catching up to do. In fact, with that seductress gone, there were even lesser interruptions to Zahida’s daily life. She alone could be the center of attention in her room.
The daughters kept trying to tell her about some disease that made you think certain things that were not there; that Abbu was dead, and Sohnipat was in another country now. But, no matter what anyone said, there were still some things Zahida Begum of Sohnipat was certain she knew better than others, and this was one of them: the voices were real, the voices were real, the voices were real.
Zuneera Shah, born and raised in Lahore, is an aspiring writer currently based in Cambridge, MA. A fourth-year undergraduate, Zuneera studies Political Science and Gender Studies and hopes to work in development after graduating. Apart from fiction, Zuneera pens opinion pieces on sociopolitical issues. Zuneera is currently working on her first collection of short stories.
Lose Yourself by Sudip Bhattacharya
Every time, he’d apologize. Every time, he’d place a hand on her back, and rub counterclockwise. No one knows me like you do, he’d say, which was true to an extent. After all, Sita and he were friends since elementary school and after what happened to Sita at UConn and when she returned, he was there, ready to welcome her.
A Different Music by Ayeda Hussain
Yes, she admitted to her shell-shocked parents’ friends one evening: she liked John Denver more than Iqbal Bano. She understood him; the lyrics made sense. But more importantly, his songs made her happy. She had heard them call it “hippie music” but she didn’t care. She wanted it, she needed it, she craved it.
Zahida by Zuneera Shah
“It was during those days that Zahida became certain there were some things she knew better than others, and this was definitely one of them: the shelf-life of death was shorter than any other item in this world, and would not last, even a single day, on her Chai trolley. It expired immediately, and Zahida knew that if it was not thrown out, it would quickly begin to stink up the place.”
What Happens In India Does Not Stay In India
by Mira Jacob
But where had her father gone? Now missing for more than six hours, Thomas had sent the house into tumult in his absence. Ammachy wandered from room to room, fighting with anyone who crossed her path. Sunil, having crossed her path twice already, found a bottle of toddy and was devouring it in the rarely visited parlor. Divya had tucked herself in a corner of the verandah. Itty ran circles on the roof. Kamala, Akhil, and Amina sat on the upstairs bed, playing their fourth game of Chinese checkers.
“Your move, Mom,” Akhil said.
“Yes.” Kamala glanced down at her watch and inched a blue marble toward a yellow triangle.
“What time is it?” Amina asked.
“Nine-thirty.”
Akhil did an elaborate series of jumps, sliding one more marble into configuration.
Amina sighed. “I don’t want to play anymore.”
“That’s just because I’m winning,” Akhil countered.
“You win every game!”
“So don’t play.” Kamala rubbed her own forehead, smoothing out the lines that had settled into it.
“But there’s nothing else to do!”
“Enough of whining! Go see what Itty is up to!”
But Amina didn’t want to see Itty any more than she wanted to see the Chinese checkerboard, or the inside of her parents’ sweltering bedroom, or Akhil gloating for the millionth time in a row. She pushed off the bed, heading instead to the stifling, fanless stairway, and lay down at the top of steps, letting the marble’s momentary coolness slide into her. A whole muffled world rumbled under her ear, clicks and groans of the house, the shup-shupping of someone’s slippers, slow, whale-like moans that she imagined coming from the depths of a huge, cool ocean. Her hip bones dug into the floor, and she heard something else. Singing. Was someone singing? Amina lifted her head off the floor.
“. . . fingers in my hair, that sly come-hither stare . . .”
Music! It was coming from below. Amina peeked over the stairwell. She crept down a few steps, and then a few more, until she was able to see into the parlor.
“Witchcraft . . . ,” the record sang, and Sunil along with it, his eyes shut, his face shining. A record spun in neat circles on the turntable, and next to it, her uncle followed, arms cupping the air in front of him, knees bouncing.
Amina stared in dismay as Sunil pivoted from one foot to the other, his hips cutting the air in deft strokes. It was like watching a muskrat slip into the Rio Grande, all of its clumsiness turned to instinctual grace. His meaty upper half arced, dipping near to the floor, then back up.
“I know it’s strictly taboo . . .”
The lightness in his face was something Amina had never seen before. He was, she realized for the first time, a handsome man. Not movie-star handsome like Buck Rogers, not even tall and sharp-jawed like Thomas, but appealing all the same. He took one quick step back and twirled to the right, his hand guiding an invisible partner.
“Sunil!”
Both Sunil and Amina jumped as Ammachy appeared in the doorway, arms folded tightly over her chest, sniffing at the room. Amina turned and ran up a few stairs, so she wasn’t sure what happened next, whether her grandmother actually sent the needle skidding across the record or if Sunil had done it himself, but the quiet that followed hummed with potential disaster.
“This again,” Ammachy said.
Shuffling. The sound of liquid being poured. A glass slammed on a table.
“You’ve had enough already, Sunil. Go to bed.”
Silence. Amina leaned forward. They were switching rapidly between English and Malayalam, which always just sounded like argada-argada-argada to her, until her grandmother demanded, “And where exactly is your brother?”
“I already told you, I don’t know.”
“So? You can’t be bothered to look for him?”
A sigh, a snort. “Please, Amma.”
“He’s your brother!” Ammachy snarled.
“Argada-argada.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
Sunil loosed another sigh, but this one was forced, feigned boredom hiding anger. “It means that Thomas is Thomas and he will go where he wants when he wants. You of all people should know that.”
“Oh, stop it with that. No one is interested in your babbling.”
“Idiot! You’re drunk. Argada-argada-argada.”
Amina slid her feet over the edge of one stair, then another. She peeked around the wall to find her uncle slumped into a living room chair, all trace of music and movement sucked from him. Ammachy hovered over the chair, the bright green silk of her sari glowing.
“How dare you do this?” she hissed.
“What now?” Sunil shut his eyes, leaning his head back on the chair.
“Feeling sorry for yourself again. Today of all days!”
“I don’t know what—”
“The house! You finally got him to give it to you.”
There was a moment while this sank in, Sunil’s bid for detachment redirecting. He sat up. “You think . . . you think signing over the house was my idea?”
“All the time he is giving you things, feeling sorry for you! Poor Sunil didn’t get the same opportunities, poor Sunil doesn’t have enough! And now you’ve taken the house!”
“He gave it to me.”
“Because he is always taking care of you.”
“Because he wanted me to take it from him.” Sunil rose from the couch. “You think he wants to live here?”
“He doesn’t know what he wants yet!”
“He doesn’t . . . You believe that, Amma? That Thomas has been gone these ten years because he doesn’t know what he wants?” Sunil laughed, but underneath there was tightness in his voice. “You think he wants to sit and rot every day in this place instead of running off to America and sending checks?”
“He sends the money for you!”
“He sends it for himself, Amma! He sends it so he doesn’t have to come. My God, you must know that by now.”
If she did know it, Ammachy gave no sign, choosing instead to wrap the end of her sari tightly around her shoulders. “Go to bed!”
“You think Thomas would ever give me something he actually wanted?” Sunil shouted as she walked into the hallway, and Amina covered her ears, suddenly understanding that she had heard too much. She felt for the step behind her with one foot, then the other, hoping illogically that if she walked all the way to her parents’ room backward, she would unremember the entire conversation. The knob was cool against her palm as she twisted it and shuffled into the bedroom.
“What’s wrong with you?”
Amina turned around to find her mother frowning at her.
“Nothing.” Amina sat on the bed.
“You’re feeling sick?”
“Did you make BM today?”
Akhil rolled his eyes. “Sure you did, poo bag.”
“Akhil,” Kamala snapped. “Enough. Your move.”
“Helloooo, Mom, anyone home? I won already.”
“Fine, so do something with yourself.”
“Like what? Make Amina poo?”
Amina rushed at him, digging deep into his belly with her nails so that he shrieked, knocking over the game and the marbles, which spilled across the bed, providing an unlikely torture device as he slammed her on her back. He twisted his head to spit on her, and Amina grabbed an ear, pulling as hard as she could.
“AMINAKHIL! STOP THIS BUSINESS AT ONCE!” Kamala pushed between them, sharp hands collaring their necks. She forced them apart.
“Jerkface!”
“Diaper!”
Amina kicked at him again, and her mother squeezed her throat. “Ow!”
“My God,” Thomas said from the doorway. “What is all that about?”
The family turned to him, panting, and Thomas walked into the room, a sweet and funky cloud of toddy on him. He smiled his lopsided smile, and no one knew what to say.
“You missed dinner,” Kamala finally said.
“I know, I know. Sorry.”
“Where were you?”
“Out where? Doing what?”
“Well . . .” Thomas looked at them, as if considering something. “Making plans, actually.”
“What plans?”
“Well . . .” He looked from Akhil to Amina to Kamala and back again. “Okay, listen. I have some big news.”
“You do?” Kamala’s hands dropped, and her voice was soft with excitement.
“We’re going on a trip!”
“To the beach! Sundar Mukherjee’s wife is a travel agent, and she booked us rooms at the Royal Crown Suites in Kovalam!”
“What’s Kovalam?” Akhil asked.
“Rooms?” Kamala’s face darkened. “What for?”
“Kovalam is the beach on the peninsula,” Thomas told Akhil. “It’s very nice.”
“But we don’t have time, Thomas! My sisters will be—” Kamala began.
“We’ll get to Lila’s on time. We’ll just leave here a little early.”
“Early?” Kamala asked. “How early?”
“Tomorrow midday.”
“We need to rest, koche. A real vacation.”
“Vacation?” Kamala’s voice dropped an octave, like she was saying drug binge or spending spree. “Thomas, what are you talking about?”
“A break! A little peace and quiet! You know, a chance for us to just relax.”
“I’m relaxed!” Kamala protested, looking anything but.
“No you’re not. And how could you be with my mother nagging you all the time?” Thomas raised his hands into the air. “Impossible! She’s made it impossible. It’s not fair to you or the children. No wonder everyone is fighting!”
“A beach like Hawaii?” Akhil asked. “Does the hotel have TV?”
“Yes, I believe it does.”
“Does it have a swimming pool?” Amina asked.
“It has a very nice pool,” Thomas informed her. “I believe there’s even a bar in the middle, where you can swim up and order a fizzy drink.”
Amina gulped, dizzy with possibility.
“Thomas,” Kamala said sharply. “We can’t just go.”
“You know why not!” She raised her eyebrow at the bedroom door, as though it were Ammachy herself. “Have you told her?”
“Don’t worry about that! I will explain tomorrow. I’m sure she’ll understand.”
“Tomorrow? Understand? Have you lost your minds? Besides, what will the neighbors think? Everyone will talk!”
“Who cares what the neighbors think?” Thomas scoffed.
“Everyone cares what the neighbors think!”
“Kamala,” Thomas sighed, rubbing his neck. “It’s not such a big deal. We’ll be leaving a few days early to go to the coast, that’s all. Don’t make it into a federal case, okay?”
Kamala got off the bed and opened the bedroom door. She looked at the children. “Out.”
“What? No, Mom, this is a family discussion, right? We’re entitled to—” Akhil started.
Akhil and Amina scooted off the bed as quickly as the marbles and bedsheets would allow, walking straight across the hall into their own room. They waited exactly five seconds after Kamala shut the door to slide out onto the verandah, where they could watch their parents but remain hidden in the dark.
“—can’t. It’s just not done,” Kamala was saying.
Thomas opened his mouth to protest, but she cut him off with the flat of her hand.
“Bad enough the son leaves for America, then he comes home and stays for all of three days only?”
Thomas sniffed. “Don’t let’s start with all that.”
“I am not starting anything! You yourself started this business!”
“Enough, Kam. I am warning you.”
“You don’t warn me when I’m warning you!”
“She lied to me!”
“So what, now you want to run away? All because Dr. Abraham came?”
“She told him I wanted a job!”
“And you told her you would come back after studies! So? You are two liars! So what?” Kamala spun toward the window and Amina ducked, but her mother wasn’t looking at her. She was scooping up loose marbles and placing them in the game box.
“I did not lie, Kamala. It’s not as though I planned this.”
“No, of course not, His Holiness of Sainthood and Angels! You would never do such a thing!” Kamala shoved the top onto the game box. “You just studied the one branch in all of medicine that would be difficult to practice here and were shocked to death to learn that you could not practice it here!”
Thomas’s mouth hung open. He blinked several times before answering. “You saw me, Kamala. I asked at Vellore. I checked in Madras. I even looked in Delhi, for the love of God!”
“Yes, you said.”
“And what? You think I’m lying to you now?”
“No,” Kamala said, uncertainty creeping onto her face.
“The technology is not here yet! What do you want? You want me to work some miserable job just so we can be here?”
“I am just saying—”
“Answer me! Is that what you want? How about if I become a dentist? We can live right here, upstairs.”
“That’s not what I—and anyway, what’s so bad? So you don’t do the surgery! You are still a doctor! We could still have a good life.”
Amina had not known, until that very moment, that her father could look so bloodless, the color draining from his face until it looked like an angry husk. “What is so wrong with your life, Kamala?”
“We are not talking about me!”
“What is it that you long for? What opportunity have you not been given?”
Kamala fumed at the floor. “Nobody is talking about that.”
“Is it the house? It’s not big enough? You don’t like your car?”
“Don’t be a silly.”
“You want to come back here, is that it? After all these years, after everything we have built for ourselves there, after all that I have tried to give you, you want to uproot the kids from their entire lives and just move back here?”
Kamala’s lips clamped shut.
“What can you have here that you can’t at home?” Thomas took a step forward. “Really, tell me! You sit here like some pained mermaid longing for her sea, but what is it, really, that you don’t have back in the States? Your sisters who live in all different towns here anyway? Your independence? Enough help around the house? Someone to—”
“Myself,” Kamala said.
Thomas swayed a little bit, as if slapped.
“Myself,” Kamala said again, her eyes filling with tears she wiped away hastily, and Thomas’s arms dropped in their sockets. They did not look at each other then, but at the floor. A moment later Thomas turned and left the room, shoes heavy on the steps. Amina leaned over the verandah’s edge a few seconds later, watching him cross the yard, heading back to the gate. Akhil tugged her arm.
C’mon, he mouthed.
The lock screeched open again, letting Thomas back out to the street, and Kamala sat on the bed. Something round and hard moved from Amina’s throat to her gut, making it difficult to breathe. Akhil frowned at her.
“Let’s go, stupid,” he hissed, and she turned and followed him back inside, glad to have somewhere to go.
(From the book The Sleepwalker’s Guide to Dancing by Mira Jacob. Copyright © 2014 by Mira Jacob. Published by arrangement with Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC)
Mira Jacob is the author of the critically acclaimed novel, The Sleepwalker’s Guide to Dancing, which was shortlisted for India’s Tata First Literature Award, honored by the APALA, and named one of the best books of 2014 by Kirkus Reviews, the Boston Globe, Goodreads, Bustle, and The Millions. She is the co-founder of much-loved Pete’s Reading Series in Brooklyn, where she spent 13 years bringing literary fiction, non-fiction, and poetry to the city’s sweetest stage. Her recent writing and short stories have appeared in Guernica, Vogue, the Telegraph, and Bookanista, and earlier work has appeared in various magazines (RED, Redbook, i-D, Metropolis, STEP), books (Footnotes with Kenneth Cole; Simon & Schuster; Adios Barbie, Seal Press), on television (VH-1?s Pop-Up Video), and across the web. She has appeared on national and local television and radio, and has taught writing to students of all ages in New York, New Mexico, and Barcelona. She currently teaches fiction at NYU. In September 2014, Mira was named the Emerging Novelist Honoree at Hudson Valley Writer’s Center, where she received a commendation from the U.S. Congress. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband, documentary filmmaker Jed Rothstein, and their son.
by Sharanya Manivannan
Image credit: © 2014 Sharanya Manivanan | “Corvus” | acrylic
When we went to lunch the day before the moon turned into a white crow, I slid a foot out of its slipper and found his toes with it. We were at a Chinese restaurant neither of us had been to before, a place I think was called Sunflower; or maybe that was the name of the parlour beside it, with its posters of Shanghainese beauties from another era in the window and hanzi characters above its entrance. I sat facing the door, which opened rarely. The restaurant comforted me, its small red altar in a corner some sigil of what was real amongst its own exaggerations.
The bottom of my belly thrummed pleasantly, sated and hungry at once. K?ma examined the menu.
“How do you say thank you in Chinese?”
“Xie xie.” In those days I took pleasure in knowing I could thank, swear and say “I love you” in a handful of languages—everything I thought I needed for at least one affair in a foreign land.
But he spoke to me mostly in Tamil, and I spoke to him mostly in English, and in bed the two merged: the latter for commands, jokes, smut. The former, always, for tenderness.
The waiter came and took our order. K?ma handed the menu back to him and said gravely, “Xie xie.”
I broke into an aghast laugh. He looked at me and I looked at him and I shook my head but couldn’t look away. I had let him get away with worse.
The food arrived and we disengaged our toes at the same moment. He scooped the fried rice onto my plate. I carved a portion of the Mandarin fish for him. I wiped two sets of cutlery with a tissue and handed his to him, feeling a pang of regret that I had never learnt how to use chopsticks, which an ex-boyfriend had called elegant. I watched him begin unhesitatingly, without waiting for me, and once again the question of what drew him to me more flickered in my mind briefly: the glamorous patchwork of my history, or the simple fact of my face, its unambiguous nativity.
I had known him for a much longer time than I had been sleeping with him, but sex has a way of setting back the clock. Everything before those few months had faded into irrelevance. He had re-entered my life like a changing season: without omen, a single door opened onto a transformed landscape, rainfall from a cloudless sky, a tree that burst into ripeness overnight. I prepared for him to leave it the same way.
What drew me to him was the same thing that has ever drawn me to any man, before or since: a latent brutality, an undisclosed yet evident vulnerability. An instinct for self-preservation, and the willingness to allow its breaching. The ability to deepen my capacity for all of these in equal measure.
Someone once told me about the sadness, a long time ago, before I would have imagined that sadness possible.
He said: “It will begin, as will all else that will follow it, already tinged with a sadness you won’t know what to do with.”
I thought he had meant the sadness of the past, the sadness I would enter a new entanglement—and all others that would follow it—carrying. But what he had meant, I understood eventually, was only the sadness of foreknowledge. Of seeing an end before it happened. Of standing at a window and looking at the sea sparkling in the afternoon sun, while inside your body something far less pacific shattered itself over and over, a tide you had come to know, recognize, call by name.
Because the man who had told me this had been neither among my lovers nor among my regrets, I could accept his words without introspection, the way one carries the fact of one’s childhood, or one’s own name. I thought of them often the season I was with Kamalesh. I would uncoil his arms from around me and go and sit at his window while he took his afternoon nap, and I would ponder those words, ponder that sadness.
It was always the same those afternoons. The leafless tree in the empty lot beside the apartment block would sway lightly in the breeze. The sea would darken. A murder of crows would flap their dark wings low across the sky. And I would think, already nostalgic, that this was what I would miss—the sound of waves and the cawing, that particular beach wind, the sense of being at a boundary and at a beginning all at once. I would go to his window so that I would always remember to keep the horizon in my sight, its approaching peril, its open, guileless face.
K?ma, he liked me to call him. The god of love expressed through lust. It wasn’t the name his parents had given him. But it wasn’t for either of us to question.
He would pick me up in his Maruti 800 from the back entrance of the Marundeeshwarar temple, which I’d walk to from the bus depot at Thiruvanmiyur. We would make love through the morning, and then we’d cook or go out for lunch. This was our routine, almost every other day, for months. I could have spent all my life that way, but the beauty of those present things was that they belonged only to their moment, their succinct and singular tempo.
We had parked right outside the restaurant. At the far end of the road was the church of the Virgin of Velankanni, and beyond that, the sea. It had not yet rained that year, and wouldn’t for months more, but this part of the city didn’t have the same suffocating quality the heat gave the rest. That would change of course, once the neighborhood had been thoroughly layered with his prints. I was trying to avert this. Emotional geography collects like plaque: a little carelessness and it’s there before you know it. He put his sunglasses on and looked at me. I smiled. He thought he was very sexy with his shades on. He was.
“My car needs to be washed,” he murmured apologetically, and pointed at the crow shit. I hadn’t even noticed. There was a lot of it, even on the front window. I had never noticed, though it now seemed clear from the dust that coated the rest of it that I must have seen his car dozens of times since he had last had it cleaned.
“Your ancestors are shitting all over your intentions,” I said, not meaning it at all.
“And yours?” Sometimes I wondered why my parents had ever left Madras when, decades later, my life was an ‘80s Tamil film anyway, all kissing on rooftops and curfews and the way P. Suheela’s voice rose with unhindered clarity from the watchman’s mini-radio downstairs during the scheduled power cuts.
Back in his flat, we spent the next two hours laughing and cuddling, with him insisting he was going to sleep, but always catching himself before he actually did. “It’s good to hold you,” he breathed into my ear. And although I knew better, I couldn’t help but recognize that what he meant was: he would rather hold me halfway, half-awake, and know it than slumber not mindful that I was in his arms at all.
That night I woke feeling like I was weightless in water, like the sea had come in through my doors and cradled me in my sleep. I let it lull me back to sleep. When I woke a second time it was 3:30am. Outside my window the sky was tenebrous, reddish. The silhouette of palm fronds wavered in the wind through the wrought-iron bars. I was thirsty. I was miles from the beach and I longed for it. I wondered if K?ma could hear the tides from his bed, if I would still be awake if I was there too.
There were crows cawing even at that hour. I got up and retied my lungi, washed my face, poured myself a small glass of cranberry juice and wished there was vodka in it. I checked my messages. A friend on the other side of the world had recorded Szymborska into his phone, and I listened to his grave and earnest reading against the landscape of what I knew of his loss and what I knew of my longing and wasn’t certain what lines to send him, to travel back to him by way of thanks and consolation.
There was no sense in going back to bed, not when the night had coaxed me awake so many times, as if to say, like a ravenous lover, I belong to you alone. I watched the sunrise bleed over the sky and when my mother came out from the bathroom, her wet hair turbaned, and touched my shoulder and said, “It’s Saturday, will you keep the rice out?” I put on my slippers and went downstairs. On the stone wall at the back of the property, I placed the handful of boiled rice and mustard seeds she had given me, stepped away, and waited for the first black bird to swoop down.
Because my grandmother’s funeral had been on a Saturday, a small black chicken was tied by its feet to the front of her bier. Because as a woman I had not been allowed into the cremation grounds, I can only surmise that it would have burnt with her on her pyre, alive but comatose. It wasn’t comatose when I knelt before her pyre though. I had placed my forehead on the cement in our driveway and closed my eyes to its squawking.
I walked back down the same driveway and went back up to our flat, listening to the sounds of the crows behind me. We had started to feed the ancestors only after my grandmother had died. That was a love that was worth generations.
Asclepius, whose mother Coronis was betrayed by a crow, was carved out of his mother’s womb as she lay on her pyre. His name meant “to cut open.” He became the god of healing. His father, Apollo, had had so many lovers—yet he had not been able to fathom the idea that he was not her only one.
When I lay in K?ma’s arms I had neither wounds nor memory of them. Only the sadness, sometimes. He was the only one who ever adored me. To adore: to worship, without fear or plea. For this and no other reason, he has my loyalty for life.
Much as well as a little later, there would be men who mimed those gestures of intimacy that only K?ma, I believed, ever rendered sincerely. And as much as I loved, or wanted to love, them, it wasn’t the same—no one else stroked my hair that way or held my feet that way or eyed me across a room quite like he did. No one else didn’t know how to lie.
There was one man who seemed to discover the eloquence of kissing the hand only when I first kissed his, because the way he then took mine and did the same suggested unfamiliarity, wonder, the simplicity of imitation. I would later grieve thinking about the other women he would confer the same upon, this tenderness I had given him. As though anything in any of us is truly new, unclaimed.
That was Martand. From him I learnt the pleasure of the licked eyelid, what it means to paint the eye with the salt of the tongue. I, too, would give that gesture away, to an intoxicated lover who kissed even my elbows as we fell asleep, only to tell me the next day that he had no memory of having initiated the encounter between us. I said nothing. How do we do this—speak with our bodies even as we swallow our voices?
The crow that betrayed Coronis was scorched by the very one he betrayed her to. Its snowlike feathers turned obsidian. Silence is its own terrible smoulder. But truth-telling lacquers a darker, richer damage.
I betrayed Martand with K?ma. Neither of them will tell you what I did. Both of them will tell you it didn’t matter. But only I know what it cost me. Only I knew that incineration.
K?ma, the god of desirousness, was also incinerated.
All things are written. The gods already knew that only the son of the meditating Shivan could kill the asura who wreaked havoc on their rites. A son with a warrior’s temperament and six perfect jewel-like faces. But Shivan was an ascetic, a widower, turned inward through the falconry hood of contemplation. His wife, Dakshayani, had immolated herself. Inconsolable, Shivan had lifted her charred body to his shoulder and tried to obliterate his consciousness—obliterate the universe—in dance. Unable to bear his unbearable suffering, the other gods had her body dismembered—each fragment of flesh and drop of blood hallowing the earth where it fell. Every sacred space begins as a theatre of grief. Out of trauma comes transformation.
The dismembered goddess was reborn: comely, wiser, her heart cleansed by a different lifetime of tears, she laughed more freely and lived more fiercely. She was a deepened furrow. Emancipated this time from shame and obligation, having seen beyond the illusion of that which binds into the truth of that which is, she longed to once again be Shivan’s companion. And the gods longed for the son she would then bring into being. And so she stood there before Shivan in her dancing anklets, her pulse thrumming even in her throat, and watched as K?ma, parrot-rider, manifested an untimely spring in the cosmos. He moved in the spiral of a southern breeze, a hum of fragrant sweetness. He poised an arrow of flowers strung on a bow of sugarcane and took aim at the meditating god.
At the moment of piercing, a furious Shivan opened his third eye and the fire of his wrath turned K?ma to ashes instantly.
And then he noticed Parvati, her turmeric limbs and luminescent eyes.
For his righteous intent, for the six-faceted son and the consort of variegated personae, for love itself, in its manifold dimensions, K?ma was revived. He was allowed to prevail. But formlessly.
Which is why the spirit of love is bodiless; only its performance is corporeal.
At that time, in those days when I would thirst for the sea because something was always burning, K?ma was my only lover. I was not his only girlfriend, though. She was nowhere in the vicinity, not truly, that other woman on a distant continent. We said her name between us sometimes in conversation, in order to put distance between ourselves.
Not long after it was over with Martand, K?ma and I went to the beach on a new moon night. Valmiki Nagar. The ocean sulking, holding her secrets closer than usual. We sat on the shore and he let me cry, holding my hand as I did. An aravani came to us and clapped in K?ma’s face for the rupee notes he promptly fished out of his breast pocket.
“You’ ve come with your girl, mapillai,” she said. “Don’t you want a good long life together?” She thought we were newlyweds. I giggled. In less than three years, he would be someone else’s husband. I was sure I was not meant to be anybody’s bride.
The sighting of a white crow is said, I would learn later on, to be an omen of a blessing that would come to be lost through greed. The white crow says: Look within. The white crow says: See, ahead, what you will be without.
I rarely spent the night at K?ma’s. It was too difficult to do often—the question of what I would tell my parents was one worth risking only with discretion. In my twenties and for a long time afterward, the city was still that sort of place. This didn’t mean it never happened. The first time I slept over had been impulsive: there are moons over Madras sometimes that eclipse everything else, all semblance of pretense or pragmatism. There had been one such moon that night, orange-flamed and balsamic. There had been no question of going home.
That Saturday, however, as I took the lift back up to my apartment after feeding the ancestors there was a definite whirr of plan-making in my mind. I intended to spend the weekend with him, to arrive a little before sunset and stay until after dinner the following evening. Somewhere there was a suggestion of a long drive, later that day or the following morning. We would trace the hem of the sea southwards, from his house on the border of the city to as far as we felt we could go without losing ourselves.
And then we would park the car in some semi-private enclave, behind a stone wall someone built to stake and divide land, and run into one of the hundred casuarina groves, through the trees, not stopping until our feet were in the water and our heads were in the clouds.
The casuarina beach was somewhere between the artists’ village and the temple of the eternal bridegroom. We had done this enough times before: turning off the road when the desire to seized us. Always a different beach along the coast. We were not always alone – in the near distance we could usually see others like us, pairs and sometimes small groups. We veered away from loners. They always scared us back to the car in some uninterrogated anxiety.
It was a full moon night: a perfect moon, gravid and gorgeous, already high enough in the sky to be an immaculate alabaster circle.
“In my mother’s country,” I said, “days of the full moon are public holidays.”
He kissed my hand as we stepped into the water. “When are we going there?” he asked, and I smiled at the moon because I’d already given away too much.
How small a crow can seem when it is still and how large when it takes flight toward you.
The moon was a coin. The moon was a compass rose. The moon was a crow: quickfire light, quills of ivory. She swooped right down toward us, mouth open, pink as modesty. Grandmother eyes. Primordial voice.
We’d been holding hands, lying on our backs with our feet in the foam and our hair full of drying sand. We both leapt up, gasping. We’d seen her, feathered like salt, heard that unmistakable cry. But when we looked up again, the words desiccating on our tongues, there she still was. Calmly unblinking, still brooched to the sky. Not a wisp of a feather, not an echo. Occulted moon, more enigmatic than ever before.
Because we had both seen it, neither one could correct the other, could say: trick of light, trompe-l’œil. K?ma was quiet on the drive back. It was I who, in the absence of all other sound, filled it with singing.
For a while, we were lucky. For a while, we were happy.
Beautiful K?ma, with his godlike body and his childlike folly. Beautiful K?ma who set all the rules he thought he lived beyond. Who tested the waters not knowing—poor baby—that water is volatile. That you cannot measure a depth. You can only measure a distance.
At the time, it had ended painlessly enough. I had walked away from that apartment, with its sea view and its sun-cartridged afternoons, and hailed an auto—I will never forget this—driven by a man who wore a pendant around his neck that was shaped like the skeleton of a fish.
Most of the pain, that sadness that had tinged everything (I came to realise later), had been in the effort of keeping it from meeting its denouement, but once I allowed it to happen it slipped away cleanly, without residual rawness. Amputation is simple, a question of the correct knife. Resurrection requires more subtle energies.
I would return to that apartment in so many guises. Adulterous, armed to the teeth, my body an arcana of alibis. I don’t know what it is about infidelity that makes it so damn hot. I don’t know how it was ever worth it. No, that is not true. The problem is that, in my most profoundly honest moments, naked of spirit and windswept of heart, I do.
But that evening, willful and self-possessed, I walked out believing it was over, that I had seen the last of those seaward windows. They were over, those days of rhythmically uncomplicated pleasure. What I didn’t know was that there would still be other kinds. Of complications. Of pleasures. I took flight with such certitude.
And like a winged creature blotting itself out onto the sun, I scorched right into Martand.
The one thing I know to be true is not that love is all there is, or that everything dies. It is that everybody has want. It’s a tiny nerve, a vein of gypsum, that runs through everything—everyone—and sometimes I see someone else’s so clearly that it catches me by the throat. In every place I have been in the world I have looked at people and seen right through into their lives, into the one true thing for which this wretched bittersweet is worth enduring, and I have broken into pieces at the recognition of it. It’s the smallest thing. The smallest, smallest, smallest thing.
K?ma brings his children to me for my foreign folktales and the seer fish curry I must stop making for them when they become old enough to decipher the recipe from taste. The boy comes up to my hip, the place on my body where a phoenix would be inked onto my skin, if I were capable of that kind of lifelong allegiance. The girl, like her father, presses herself to my breast when she hugs me, and always needs to be coaxed to let go.
It is astonishing how strong you become, when you’ve spent a lot of time being other people’s weaknesses. I could never find the kind of responsible love that most people had, if they had it at all. I fell hopelessly for maladroit men who took the ‘cage’ in ‘ribcage’ to heart, and admired women who had never known what long-married love was like. I was always the object of desire, the souvenir, the receptacle of memories of wildness, a parenthesis in their experience of an unexceptional world.
Because I could not find slow love, love that could age, I grew into the evanescence that others sought me for. After a point, I could no longer withhold—and I could no longer amputate. So I began to adore simply, not loudly, and always in the awareness that those like me must live like flowering trees. We are who we are, prosperously or otherwise. And our lives are crowned, now and then, with moments of exaltation—each held and breathed in deeply, and then let go.
Some nights I still wake to the sound of crows crying. And I think of Kakabhujandi, the raven in the tree of life, who listens to the ancient stories and tells them again. Always adding his watermark, his song that is also the first syllable in the old alphabet—Ka. The same word as the question Why.
And depending on where I am, I will stay in bed and look at the bruise-bitten night through the skylight or the undraped window. Always, this sky. And I’ll sigh, calm my breath and listen, and wonder.
Sharanya Manivannan’s first book of poems, Witchcraft, was described by The Straits Times (Singapore) as “sensuous and spiritual, delicate and dangerous and as full as the moon reflected in a knife.” She has received a Lavanya Sankaran Fellowship and an ELLE Fiction Award, and been nominated for the Pushcart Prize twice. She wrote a column, The Venus Flytrap, between 2008 and 2011 in The New Indian Express, and her fiction, poetry and essays have been widely published internationally, including in Drunken Boat, Wasafiri, Hobart, Killing The Buddha, and Superstition Review. Twitter: @ranyamanivannan
[caption id="attachment_9924" align="alignnone" width="150"] illustration by Meghna Singh Bhadauria[/caption] “Ripeti do
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Welcome to unde omnis iste natus error sit voluptatem accusantium
Keep conected
In the Seanad
Legislative Work
Voting At 16 Bill to be Debated in Seanad
Independent Senator Lynn Ruane will second the Electoral Amendment (Voting At 16) Bill 2016 on Wednesday 29th March in Seanad Éireann. The legislation is being proposed by Senator Fintan Warfield of Sinn Féin and if passed through both Houses of the Oireachtas, would reduce the voting age at local government and European Parliament elections to 16.
Voting At 16 BillI was very disappointed to see Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael block our #VoteAt16 bill in the Seanad on Wednesday. The justification given for the decision did not stand up to scrutiny and it is now very unlikely that Irish young people will be enfranchised by the 2019 European and local elections.
Posted by Lynn Ruane on Friday, 31 March 2017
Independent Senator Lynn Ruane said:
“It’s a sad fact that it is young people who are most affected by political decisions taken today but have no voice in who makes those decisions for them. Inclusion of Irish citizens between the ages of 16 and 18 in the democratic process is the only way this will ever change.
“This Bill is a crucial first step in realising a stronger and more vibrant democratic contract between the Irish people and our European political representation and local government structures.
“Reducing the voting age for local government is vital to ensure the full engagement of young people with local politics and their local communities. Moreover, during this crucial period for the future of the European Union, we need young people to have a voice in deciding our future role in a post-Brexit EU.
“The Government have recently demonstrated a commitment to broadening democratic participation, with the recent announcement of the referendum to extend presidential voting rights to our diaspora. In the same spirit, we ask that they ensure the speedy passage of this legislation through the Oireachtas.”
Senator Fintan Warfield, who is proposing the legislation, said:
“Our amendment Bill titled; Electoral (Voting at 16) Bill 2016, seeks to lower the voting age from 18 to 16 for Local and European elections. This Bill is timely in advance of the 2019 Local and European elections, particularly given an official endorsement by the European Parliament to support voting at 16 in European Parliament elections and a recommendation of the Constitutional Convention in 2013.
“The referendum for Scottish independence and the referendum for civil marriage equality represent a reality that young people are at the cutting edge of change. Their voices must begin to be heard by our political representatives, who at times have proven themselves to be out of touch with young people, and in turn struggle to hold their political representatives to account. Only by widening the political franchise can we guarantee that the rights of young people stay firmly on the agenda of politicians.
“Sinn Féin are serious about legislating for the rights of young people. We are hopeful that this ask will be heard and supported by Senators across the chamber, particularly given the longstanding commitment to this issue by the National Youth Council of Ireland and many other youth organisations”.
A copy of the bill as initiated can be viewed here.
The bill is scheduled for debate between 5pm and 7pm and can be streamed live here.
in Latest News, Legislative Work, Press Releases
Lynn Ruane calls for reform of Electoral Act with backing of campaign groups
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Lynn Ruane is an independent senator serving in Seanad Éireann, a former President of Trinity College Dublin’s Students’ Union and a lifelong activist and campaigner on issues of justice and equality.
LATEST FROM OUR NEWS
Lynn Ruane calls for reform of Electoral Act with backing of campaign groups May 16, 2019
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@MaiaDunphy @Pandaplaycafe Big Happy Birthday to Tom ❤❤
RT @universitytimes: Jordanne Jones, an English and film student in Trinity, has been selected as one of 22 actors and filmmakers to watch…
RT @IFTA: Congratulations to @jordanne_jones on being named in @Screendaily 2019 #StarsOfTomorrow. Jordanne's already had so many great per…
lynn.ruane@oireachtas.ie
© Copyright 2016 Lynn Ruane
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Urgent steps needed to make roads safer
DURING the Eid vacation, between Tuesday and Thursday, road accidents killed at least 30 people and also left at least 121 others injured. The accidents had occurred in Dhaka, Sirajganj, Bhola, Bogura, Bagerhat, Jhenaidah, Faridpur, Netrakona, Sylhet and Cox's Bazar. Nine of those killed in the accidents were riding motorcycles. Of the accidents; highest fatalities were in Cox's Bazar, where six persons were killed and 22 were injured in two separate road accidents at Medakachchhapia Point on Cox's Bazar-Chattogram Highway and Noakhalipara Point on Cox's Bazar-Teknaf Marine Drive on Friday.
We know, it's a partial picture of road accidents. Fatalities on roads and highways during Eid journey is nothing new in the country. But we have never seen to take appropriate steps to check the death. Bangladesh Passenger Welfare Association (BPWA) said at least 405 people were killed and 1,274 were injured in 335 roads, railways and waterways accidents across the country during Eid-ul-Fitr holidays last year. Besides, more than 250 people died and 960 others injured in at least 237 road accidents during the Eid-ul-Azha vacations in 2018.
This year, the Eid journey was comparatively comfortable in comparison to previous years. Especially, the constructions of second the Meghna bridge and second Gumti bridge on Dhaka -Chattogram Highway made road communication smoother. It took only 4 hours to 4.5 hours to reach from Dhaka to Chattogram. The situation was almost same in other highways too. There was no serious tailback on the highways except a few. Undoubtedly, it was a success.
But unfortunately, road accidents are yet not controlled. Unfit vehicles are still plying on the roads by the unskilled and unlicensed drivers. The police department has failed to cease the plying of three-wheelers, Kariman and Nasimon on the highways, which contributed to road accidents. Not only that, police allowed hundreds of unfit buses and other vehicles to restore operation targeting the Eid passengers allegedly in exchange for bribe.
The Eid journey is not yet ended. Thousands of the home-goers still did not started journey for their workplaces. We do urge the authorities concerned to take stern action so that accidents could be checked. Otherwise, the procession of deaths on roads will be getting longer.
About ICC probe and punishment of Myanmar Generals
A TEAM of investigators of the International Criminal Court is due in Dhaka today to prepare for the preliminary probe into crimes committed against minority Rohingya community in Rakhine of
Killing inside court: Police role questioned
AN accused of a murder case was killed in front of a judge at a Cumilla court on Monday. The incident took place when an accused youth stabbed another one
Tragedies Of Two Cities
Mir Abdul Alim :In the rain water, the capital Dhaka and the Port City of Chattogram are sinking. People living in these two cities are trapped in water. It not
The Anthropocene Epoch
Tasdidaa Shamsi :Humans dominate Earth. Since 1950, globalisation and business tools have come handy with increased usage. The temperature is increasing causing an increase in Greenhouse Effect which is the
Readers’ Forum
For Becoming A Key Player In Ihe Global Outsourcing MarketThe term Digital Economy was first mentioned in Japan by a Japanese educator and research economist in the midst about Japan's
Using protection gear for suspects
LAW enforcers produce crime suspects in protective gear before the press and in courts but do not do so when they take out the suspects in night-time operations for cohort
Lee Nak-yeon's visit to strengthen Dhaka -Seoul ties
THE official bilateral talks between Bangladesh and South Korea held at the Prime Minister's Office in Dhaka on Sunday. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and her South Korean counterpart Lee Nak-yeon
Pedestrians' Responsibilities
Taslim Ahammad :Pedestrians make up all groups of road users, simply because all are pedestrians at some point, whether walking for fitness or leisure, going to work, heading to school,
Negligence In Health Sector
Dr. Samir Kumar Saha :Health is one of the important human rights and universally declared index of human development. Development of health not only promotes economic progress, but also ensures
Tea Workers Need To Improve The Quality Of LifeTea workers of Bangladesh have been living through illiteracy, persecution, social and cultural deprivation. They have no contact with the country's mainstream
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/ 2019 POLLS: THE FINAL PUSH
Group calls for transparency
posted May 08, 2019 at 01:15 am by Manila Standard
A pro-democracy group on Tuesday called for clean, credible and transparent elections as technology vendor Smartmatic Phils. Inc. transferred the administration of the automated election system to the Commission on Elections.
“Transparency is a key principle in ensuring credible elections. It helps establish trust and confidence in the process, as voters have an opportunity to guarantee that the results reflect the true will of the people,” Democracy Watch Philippines Secretary General Claudette Guevara said in a statement.
Guevara said technology is a key to clean and credible elections, as the AES sent the Philippines elections from the dark days of manual elections straight into the digital age in 2010.
She said that while it took several election cycles, it seems that the technology handoff between Smartmatic and Comelec has finally been completed.
“It’s encouraging to see the poll body all fired up to run the automated elections completely on its own,” she said.
Smartmatic’s role has been steadily diminishing over the last few election cycles and has been relegated to just being the system vendor and support in this year’s midterm elections.
The company was involved in around 30 different processes in 2010. While Smartmatic is still setting up the transmission infrastructure this year, very few of its personnel would be on the ground on Election Day, Democracy Watch said.
This means that an overwhelming majority of election workers that will see action this year will be under the direct supervision of Comelec, which would be in control of most components from ballot printing to warehousing and logistics.
“Kudos to both the Comelec and Smartmatic for this successful transfer of technology. This can only bode well for the country,” Guevara said.
Democracy Watch Philippines said automation played a good part in minimizing human intervention which led to faster proclamations of winners and less incidents of poll-related violence in recent elections.
“It’s a testament to the soundness of the AES that it lends itself really well to being taught and transferred. By the same token, it’s a mark of Comelec’s competence that it has learned the system well enough not to need Smartmatic’s help this time,” Guevara said.
The Comelec opened the AES to scrutiny and invited the public to ensure that the code has no insertions that could affect the results of elections.
Also on Tuesday, the National Citizens’ Movement for Free Elections said it would continue watching over the May 13 elections even without its accreditation from the Comelec.
NAMFREL last week said it declined accreditation after the Comelec denied it access to some data that would have helped identify red-flag incidents.
“NAMFREL will continue its work,” said NAMFREL Chairman Gus Lagman, speaking in Filipino to radio dzMM. “It’s just that we don’t have access to election data, but that does not mean that we will no longer carry on with other activities.”
Topics: Commission on Elections , Smartmatic Phils. Inc. , Democracy Watch Philippines , Claudette Guevara
Much ado about quo warranto
‘Audit system now’
Marcos vows to take legal action
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/ ENTERTAINMENT
/ TV & MOVIES
GMA seals partnership with AFP for ‘Descendants of the Sun’ series
posted June 24, 2019 at 06:15 pm by Manila Standard Showbitz
GMA Network’s Entertainment Group inked a partnership with the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) for the highly-anticipated Philippine adaptation of the hit Korean drama series, Descendants of the Sun.
'Descendants of the Sun' lead stars Dingdong Dantes, Jasmine Curtis-Smith, and Rocco Nacino
Present during the MOA signing on June 20, at the GMA Network Center were Major General Bienvenido R. Datuin, Jr., Commander of Civil Relations Service, Armed Forces of the Philippines (CRSAFP), GMA Senior Vice President for Entertainment Group Lilybeth G. Rasonable; GMAVice President for Drama Productions Redgie A. Magno, GMA Assistant Vice President for Drama Cheryl Ching-Sy, and Senior Program Manager Ali Nokom Dedicatoria.
The lead stars of Descendants of the Sun—Dingdong Dantes, Rocco Nacino, and Jasmine Curtis-Smith – also came in full force.
Major General Datuin is looking forward to working with the Network for the Pinoy version of the series. “The pleasure and the honor are ours. As I always say, this is an AFP that you can trust. We have evolved into your partners in the civilian community. This is an opportunity for us para maipakita ang aming core values which are patriotism, honor, and service, which I know that our actors and actresses here will be able to portray,” he said.
Rasonable, in turn, is grateful to the AFP for partnering with GMA. “First of all, we are so honored and very thankful that the AFP has agreed to help us and partner with GMA for this project. This is a much-awaited and very important flagship project of the Network and we cannot have it any other way than with the AFP helping us out,” she shared.
Joining the star-studded cast of the Philippine adaptation of Descendants of the Sun are Andre Paras, Chariz Solomon, Renz Fernandez, Lucho Ayala, Paul Salas, Prince Clemente, Jon Lucas, and Hailey Mendes.
Topics: GMA Network , Armed Forces of the Philippines , Descendants of the Sun , Dingdong Dantes , Rocco Nacino , Jasmine Curtis-Smith
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Liway’s humble win at The EDDYS 2019
Bulgarian model wins Man of the World title
Disney’s 3D ‘Lion King’ sends animation roaring forward
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Why Is AriZona Iced Tea Cheaper Than Water?
BY Jake Rossen
AriZona via Instagram
Despite being a bladder-shattering 23.5 ounces, cans of AriZona iced tea have never wavered from the 99-cent price point introduced shortly after the drink debuted in 1992. It’s even printed on the label as a way of warding off sugar-water price gouging by retailers.
The fact that AriZona has been able to resist inflation for nearly a quarter-century is impressive. The fact that the cans usually wind up being cheaper than smaller soft drinks is also impressive, until you begin to realize how strange it is that a vat of iced tea and its accompanying ingredients somehow manages to be less expensive than plain water.
In a recent interview with Thrillist, AriZona chief marketing officer and co-owner Spencer Vultaggio shed some light on this convenience store mystery.
Unlike water titans Coke (which distributes Dasani), Evian, or Fiji, AriZona has virtually no advertising dollars invested in their teas. "We feel like it's more important to spend money on something that our customer really cares about, instead of buying billboards or putting our cans in the hands of some celebrity for a few minutes," Vultaggio said.
Even with a frugal approach to ads, AriZona still has to deal with rising production costs. To help resist increasing prices to compensate, the company has pursued alternative manufacturing methods, using 40 percent less aluminum in cans and having enough factories dotting the country to make transportation more efficient. Bottled water, in contrast, is sometimes sourced from abroad, making for exorbitant shipping costs.
In the end, it’s not the iced tea that’s more economical than the water; it’s that the container it comes in is simply cheaper to produce and transport. And while AriZona isn’t above charging a premium for fancier drinks—like a tea brewed with oak chips that sells for twice the price—their branding depends heavily on those familiar rows of 99-cent cans and the loyal consumers who keep reaching for them.
Have you got a Big Question you'd like us to answer? If so, let us know by emailing us at bigquestions@mentalfloss.com.
beverages Big Questions business water
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5 months ago Cynthia Griffin Comments Off on Transformation Thursday
Morgan Boyd, music major, as a freshman.
Morgan Boyd, music major, as a senior.
Q: Why did you choose to come to Virginia Wesleyan?
A: I always laugh when I think of this question. One because I never know how to answer and two because I laugh at myself every time because I never know how to answer. So here is me trying. I came to choose VWU (when it was VWC) because I heard there was going to be a new music director entering which I thought had a lot of opportunity and promise. As well as, my sister was still at the school and my brother, who also went here.
Q: What is one of your favorite memories that you have made while at Virginia Wesleyan?
A: While being here, I’ve had the opportunity to make fantastic long lasting memories from the things that I’ve done and the people I’ve surrounded myself with and I give all the thanks of those memories to the people from the Music Department, Comm Department, Marlin Ministries, and YoungLife.
Q: If you could change one thing about your college experience what would it be?
A: I think if I could change one thing about my college experience, I would have loved to go on more adventures, with the university or the friends I have made. But it is still never too late!
Q: What piece of advice would you give to your freshman self?
A: I would tell my freshman self to not to worry about the years to come, whether in school or after, God has it all in control and it’s going to be trying, but awesome!
Q: How do you think you have changed during the four years that you have been at Wesleyan?
A: Looking at myself from freshman year to now, I feel that I’ve grown. Not just scholarly, but spiritually and personally. I’m not just the young girl coming into college naive to what was to come. From freshman year of enjoying college a little too much. To sophomore year of accepting the Lord and growing her own faith and feeling stuck because you are neither an underclassman or upperclassman. To junior year of preparing (freaking out mostly) to launch myself into senior year. And now it’s senior and I’m here and preparing for the next step, but loving every moment that I get to spend with awesome people and experiences.
Q: What is one thing that you will miss about the school after you graduate?
A: I will miss the people that I’ve gotten to know, for sure!
Cynthia Griffin
clgriffin@vwu.edu
Standing Together in a Culture of Fear
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On Tuesday, Sept. 20 the Hofheimer Library was lined with chairs that were full of students, faculty and staff from Virginia Wesleyan College. Six clubs on campus, including African... Read More
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By Kayla Brown Making a mark here at Virginia Wesleyan seemed easy for Alaskan-born freshman Mary-Rae Ratigan, who is from Franklin, Virginia. She finds it easy to adjust to... Read More
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By Theresa Yunger Virginia Wesleyan College students were busy during winter session studying abroad in Belize and London. Students interested in studying Topics in Tropical Ecology headed to Belize,... Read More
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For 50 years, Dr. Hultgren has gotten to experience all of the changes that Virginia Wesleyan has offered. Dr. Hultgren is a jack of all trades when it comes... Read More
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Moscow Art Techniques? Please clarify
Thread: Moscow Art Techniques? Please clarify
May 9th, 2009, 11:27 PM #1
Would one (or more) of you very intelligent Russians (and maybe artist type) please educate me and explain to me what the "Moscow Art Techniques" is/are as it relates to acting?
I understand that it comes from "The Moscow Art Theater School"; however, I do not understand what makes this particular style of training or technique special or different.
We are looking for an ensemble to create a showcase based on Moscow Art Techniques. Ensemble creation using the Moscow Art training techniques and Chekov's characters for a showcase production in early July 2009.
[ MALES & FEMALES ] All ages (13 & older)/all types. Bring 2 min monologue of your choice.
Старший оракул
Snowbearia
Re: Moscow Art Techniques? Please clarify
Maybe it is a synonym to "Stanislavski's System" as far as "The Moscow Art Theatre" and "The Moscow Art Theater School" were founded by Stanislavski together with Nemirovich-Danchenko.
Yes, I, too, think it's Stanislavsky's Art Techniques because there is no any Moscow Art Techniques or Moscow Art System. I think they say Moscow instead of Stanislavsky because it sounds shorter and easier to pronounce in English.
In Russian, all nationalities and their corresponding languages start with a lower-case letter.
Originally Posted by Оля
Yes, I, too, think it's Stanislavsky's Art Techniques because there is not a[s:39tnwlvl]ny[/s:39tnwlvl] Moscow Art Techniques or Moscow Art System.(you could also have said, "there's not any sort of..." or "there is no such thing as...") I think they say Moscow instead of Stanislavsky because it sounds shorter and easier to pronounce in English.
Coffee Cup & Оля…thanks for the info and the link too!
I also found out that there are a few very competitive and rigorous exchange programs between some schools here in the U.S. and The Moscow Art Theater School. If my girls continue down their path, maybe…. they should take Russian in high school (if it is offered at the school they end up going to) even though the classes at MXAT are taught in English.
using uk mobile in moscow to dial moscow
By peternorhtampton in forum General Discussion
Go to Moscow
By Mlagor in forum Travel and Tourism
Last Post: December 17th, 2008, 08:24 PM
Keyboard techniques?
By Mar in forum Getting Started with Russian
Please clarify
By Ramil in forum Learn English - Грамматика, переводы, словарный запас
Last Post: August 26th, 2006, 04:04 AM
hello from Moscow
By in forum Penpals and Language Exchange
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The hall was deserted, most of the other students having long since gone home. I emptied the books from my extra study session into my locker and turned to leave.
Shoes rang out harshly on the stone floor – half a horse tripping into half a gallop.
“Hey Brandon.”
She caught me up, grabbing my arm and leaning her full, if insubstantial, weight against me.
“Charlie.”
She was kind of cute in a bubbly, bouncy sort of way, but had no concept of subtlety. One thing about Charlie; you knew who she was into by the way she went bounding up to them like an excited puppy, all breathless eagerness and effervescent energy.
“So, what d’you have planned for Halloween?”
It was immensely flattering, of course, to have such a beautiful girl showing me this kind of attention, but I wasn’t sure if it was fair for me to respond. I mean, jealousy isn’t a good basis for any kind of relationship.
“I don’t know. Since the banks screwed up the economy, nobody seems to have any spare money. I’m not sure I can afford to do anything this year.”
It wasn’t much of an excuse, but it was good enough for me. As usual, I really didn’t feel like trying to enjoy myself – unresolved issues getting in the way. Any time I let friends talk me into ‘having a good time’, all it did was highlight the things that were missing in my life, which made me feel worse.
“Oh come on!” She tugged impatiently, and ineffectually, at my arm. “It’s times like these that you have to do something, if only to remind yourself that things can get better. I mean what’s life without hope?”
Talk about hitting the nail on the head. What is life without hope? Pretty much what I faced in the mirror every morning. The only thing that would make life worse right now would be for other people to know what I was struggling with. Ridicule or pity, either way it would just add to the weight of the world.
“I don’t know. I was just going to stay in and watch TV or something.”
“Well, I’m not going to let you stay in and mope by yourself. If you won’t come out with me, maybe I’ll come round and visit with you instead.”
There was a bullish disregard to her bright cheerfulness – she was determined I was going to have a good time whether I wanted to or not. Misery loves company they say, but I think it would draw the line at chirpy, chipper Charlie. Pretty much the only thing I could imagine handling less well than going to a party in my present state would be having to spend an evening alone with Miss Bouncy McJoyful here. Nothing against her mind you, I have a great fondness for Charlie, but a whole evening in the presence of such irrepressible good cheer, with nothing to distract me, or her…
“What did you have in mind?” I sighed.
I’m a coward, I know.
“Did you see that new notice on the bulletin board? The one from the castle? You know, ‘Doctor Francescanstein cordially invites you to a night of terror and self-discovery’ or something like that?”
There was something about the castle that really creeped me out. I mean I knew it had been there for hundreds of years, but I couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that it hadn’t been there for hundreds of years last week.
“I don’t know, Charlie. I mean, what are the chances they still have places? That notice has been up, what, a couple of days already?”
“So what’s the harm in trying? We could get lucky. Come on! we should do it!! it’ll be fun!!!”
There’s no arguing with her when she starts talking in exclamation marks. I nodded my reluctant assent and was rewarded with a little squeal of excitement as she let go my arm to rummage through her bag for her phone.
“Hello? Is that the castle? Yeah, I was wondering if you still had any spaces left for the night of terror and self-discovery. You do? Excellent! Yeah, two please? Charlotte Mattesson and Brandon Phillips. Yeah, two L’s, and mine has two T’s and two S’s. Yeah, do we need to bring anything? You know like a costume or something? Really? That is so cool. No that should be fine. OK, see you tomorrow night. Yeah, thank you so much. Bye”
She jumped up and down on the spot, causing parts of her anatomy to jiggle in disconcerting ways.
“We’re in. She said since we’re the last, we’ll have to be the victims, but that’s alright isn’t it? I mean they’re providing costumes and everything. This is going to be so cool.”
She grabbed hold of my arm again. Her enthusiasm was so infectious that even I couldn’t help smiling. Maybe this wasn’t such a bad idea after all.
It was a dark and stormy night.
No really, it was. I mean the setting couldn’t have been more perfect for Halloween, not even with a Hollywood special effects budget.
Dark, pendulous clouds boiled overhead, illuminated in brief flashes by occasional, distant lightning. The ominous silhouette of the castle appeared through the driving rain as we eased our way up the drive. There were three other cars parked opposite the main entrance, all of which I was sure I would recognise given the time, but the rain was relentless, soaking us to the skin even in the short dash to the front door.
An old fashioned bell pull connected to a distant jangling inside and we huddled under the eaves, awaiting rescue from the excess of weather. The giant oak door creaked open and we ducked into the large entrance hall without waiting for further invitation.
“You poor things.” The sultry voice came from a figure on the stairs. She wore a full length cloak of some unusual dark material and, if the brief, tantalising glimpses of pale, naked flesh were anything to go by, very little else. “Welcome to Castle Francescanstein. But you’re drenched. Please, allow Riffraff to show you to your rooms. You must take off those wet things and change into your costumes.
“The other guests are already here in the dining room,” a long, slender and completely bare arm emerged from the folds of her cloak to indicate a door to our left. Somehow the iridescent black material shifted to hide the rest of her. “Join us when you are ready.”
Riffraff, it appeared, was the small and balding servant who had opened the door for us. His smile was obsequious, and the way he seemed to bow from the shoulders vaguely suggested some deformity in his back. He led us up the stairs and down a short corridor to adjacent rooms. He ushered Charlie into the first and indicated I should go into the second.
Like the rest of the castle so far, the floor and walls were dressed stone, covered only in places by rugs and tapestries. Wind and rain assaulted the leaded glass windows, causing them to rattle in their frames, and cold drafts eddied about the room, bringing a renewed chill to my sodden form. Despite the friendly fire chuckling in the stone fireplace, I was freezing.
The room was well furnished with wardrobe, dressing table and chair. A four poster bed stood against one wall, and laid out on its covers was my costume.
I pulled the door open to be greeted by the butler’s blank grin.
“There’s been a mistake,” I explained through chattering teeth. “You’ve put me in the wrong room.”
His smile broadened and took on a measure of vacuous malevolence. He pointed to the door where my name was clearly printed on a label, then pulled it shut on me.
I turned back into the room and made a closer examination of the clothing on the bed. There was no doubt everything was considerably too big for Charlie. In fact it all looked just the right size for me, right down to the size eleven shoes. I was freezing in my soaked clothes, otherwise I wouldn’t have considered changing, but the choice seemed to be this or pneumonia. I stripped naked and made use of a convenient towel to rub some warmth back into my body.
It had been a long while since I’d done anything like this, but some things you don’t forget. The knickers were soft and seemed to have space for my extra bits. I’d never worn a suspender belt before, but the principle behind it wasn’t that challenging. I gathered up the stockings and slid them up my legs. Hairy as they were, the sensation wasn’t as sensual as I remembered, but the sheer, silky garments would provide a little added warmth in this icebox of a place. Again the clips that fastened them in place were obvious, though having so much elastic under tension so close to my tender parts was a little unnerving.
There was no bra, the dress being backless with a halter neck. I stepped into it and tied the straps behind me into a tidy bow, arranging the generous folds of the skirt until they settled neatly about my calves. The shoes were, mercifully, no more than two inches in the heel, but a precarious balance to the unpracticed even so. A silver necklace and cross, along with silver clip-on earrings and long silk gloves – white to match the dress – completed the outfit, and a fur stole gave my back some protection against the cold.
There was a full length mirror in the corner of the room beside the wardrobe, and I marshalled enough courage to look at myself. It was pretty much as I suspected, broad shoulders and well-muscled arms, ruggedly good lookingish face, hair short on the head and sprouting pretty much everywhere else. I looked exactly like Marilyn Monroe just before that famous photograph of her over the heating vent – that is, of course, assuming she had been born a gorilla. I felt warmer in the dry clothes, but I was damn sure I wasn’t ready to appear in public like this. From the number of cars out front, there were only three other couples here tonight, but it would only take a moment’s indiscretion from just one of them back at school to destroy my reputation utterly. I sat down on the bed, determined to wait it out.
There was a gentle knock on the door, and before I could react, it opened and Charlie stuck her head in.
“Brandon?” She caught sight of me and struggled to suppress a smile. “Shit, I thought I had it bad.”
She came in all the way, top hat in hand, tailcoat over silver-grey waistcoat, matching bow tie over starched wing collar, loose fitting grey trousers and shining black leather brogues to finish. She even had a walking stick in one hand.
“I can’t go down looking like this, Charlie. I look a complete and utter pillock.”
“We both do, Brandon. Don’t forget, the others will have costumes too. Maybe they’re dressed the same as us, maybe that’s what the night of terror and self-discovery thing is all about – getting in touch with the other side of our sexuality. Come on, I’ll bet they’re just as self-conscious as us.”
As usual with Charlie, I allowed myself to be persuaded and climbed unsteadily to my feet.
“Here, don’t forget this.” She picked up a clutch bag from the bed and handed it to me. “You know, you probably wouldn’t look so bad if I put a bit of makeup on you.”
“Not a chance. I look enough like a gay baboon as it is. I can’ t believe I’m doing this.”
I transferred everything from my pockets into the bag then took her hand, more for support than anything. Taking a deep breath, I followed her out to meet whatever doom awaited us.
“Arrrroooough.” The howl collapsed into helpless laughter as Pete ‘Wolfman’ Wilson caught sight of us making our entrance.
The rest of the guests turned, displaying different degrees of mirth, although none quite so unrestrained as Pete’s. Even Drusilla, Pete’s girl of the moment, managed a hint of a smile – in my experience, the Goth equivalent of unrestrained hysterics.
To my acute embarrassment, Charlie and I were the only ones cross-dressed; the others all had costumes far more in keeping with the Halloween theme – and, oddly, with their own personalities.
Pete wore an ordinary jacket and tie, but he also had on a wild wig and whiskers which, along with a pair of amber contact lenses and some very realistic extended canines, gave him a distinctly Lon Chaney wolfman look.
Drew – well Betty really, but what kind of Goth name is that? – Evans wore the lace trimmed long black dress of a Victorian Governess which, along with her usual pale makeup and jet black hair, left her looking more ghostly than usual.
“Well Brandon, don’t you look lovely tonight.”
The new voice came from Damien Bradley, school smoothie – or at least he would be if I ever found a big enough blender. He rarely opened his mouth without saying something snide and hurtful, and he wore a perpetual, self-satisfied smirk which almost everyone I knew wanted to wipe off his face. No surprise then to find him with his hair slicked back, sporting a pair of fangs and an old fashioned dinner suit.
Amy Jennings – bitch queen and long term significant other to Damien – stood next to him, controlling but not hiding her own amusement. She complemented his vampire look in a tight, dark, ankle length sheath dress that might have given Morticia Addams mobility issues. Her long dark hair was brushed back to give her a distinct widow’s peak above her pale features.
“And there was me thinking I would win the booby prize for costumes tonight, but then you don’t even have any of those do you? And that dress so needs a bit of cleavage to make it work.”
This last from Lucy Langdon who was known for her pre-emptive strikes. The theory was she was overly self-conscious of her alliterative name and constantly afraid of ridicule so chose to fight back before being attacked. She was also a bossy, control freak who appreciated muscle over mind in her men. She was wrapped from neck to toe in bandages, leaving only her hands and face free. The mummy costume was indirectly ironic of the way she treated the people around her.
Beside her loomed Steve Buckley, her own personal monolith, dutifully laughing his slow laugh. Everyone called him Brick after the proverbial shithouse he resembled, which made him the perfect candidate for a Frankenstein’s monster makeover, complete with neck bolt and scars. Mind you, he didn’t need much else to complete the illusion.
“Good,” our hostess said cheerfully, ignoring my evident discomfort and the barbed comments flying around the room. “Now we’re all here, we can start. You’ll find your places are labelled.”
Damien took the lead, holding a chair for Amy. It was a necessary courtesy given the tightness of her dress, and I still have no idea how she managed to find enough freedom of movement to fold herself into a seated position. Pete did the same for Drew, but the subtle nicety escaped Brick and earned him a dirty look from Lucy as she struggle to shuffle her own heavy chair under the table. There was a moment’s awkwardness between Charlie and me, but she won out, taking the stole from my shoulders then helping me into my seat as I arranged the pleated skirts under and around me.
“Brandon doesn’t really work does it?” Damien asked through his habitual condescending sneer. “I mean Charlie can get away with her name, but I think we need a new one for you you. What do you think guys? Brenda? Brandy?”
Chuckles rippled around the table, and even our hostess smiled as Riffraff eased her into her chair at the head of the table.
“Brandy sounds just right,” she said settling any argument before it could start. “Riffraff, would you please serve the soup.”
And so started one of the most awkward meals of my life. Conversation was stilted and infrequent. Charlie did her best to raise neutral topics, but the others – Damien, Amy and Lucy in particular – kept finding ways to twist them round into cheap insults levelled against me and my ridiculous appearance, so each new effort choked and faltered almost as soon as it was introduced.
For my part, I ate in silence, keeping my eyes down so I didn’t have to suffer the amused looks that bore down on me. Charlie’s hand reached across to squeeze my leg in sympathy and apology, but it was small succour in the grand scheme of things.
The food was excellent, and I ate with deliberate slowness, partly out of fear of spilling something on what was still an exquisite dress, even if I wasn’t shoing it off to best effect, and partly because the gloves made my grip so much less sure. I only wished I could have felt more at ease. The silky feel of the dress was a delight, but also a source of deep shame which, when added to the reaction of the other dinner guests, took away any enjoyment I might otherwise have felt.
The storm continued to rage outside, building in fury but muffled by the heavy drapes. Frequent lightning flashes leaked from behind the curtains, with the near instantaneous crashes of thunder that followed sounding subdued and distant enough not to startle anyone. A large fire roared in the fireplace behind me, the flames drawn up the chimney by the vicious wind outside. I was grateful for the warmth on my back and did my best to focus on each new flavour and texture, ignoring the less pleasant distractions around me.
From time to time I would glance up to see our hostess scrutinising me like a mouse in a maze, a knowing smile playing about the edge of her lips. Her gaze would drift around the rest of the group, maintaining an expression of supreme satisfaction. There was something predatory about her look which only served to increase my unease.
The meal dragged to an eventual conclusion. The aftermath of the last course was cleared away and we sat around sipping at our coffees. The sport of Brandon baiting lost its appeal after I adamantly refused to respond to even the most hurtful remarks. The others went through their lists of friends and acquaintances, but eventually ran out of characters to assassinate, and lapsed into silence, seeking, but not finding, inspiration in the bottoms of their coffee cups. I still hunched in and kept as low a profile as any well-built young man in a pretty dress could manage and Charlie kept quite beside me, conscious and regretful of my misery in what she had hoped would be a fun evening for both of us.
The silence endured long enough to become uncomfortable. Our hostess took her cue and stood. It was only then I realised she hadn’t eaten with us, or indeed offered much to the conversation. Her presence had been simply as an observer and sometime mediator when comments – towards me in particular – turned nasty.
“Well ladies and gentlemen, since we seem to have exhausted all pleasantries” – was there a slight emphasis on that word? – “for this part of the evening, perhaps we should get on with the real fun.”
Eyes turned towards her with renewed interest.
“I promised you all a night of terror and self-discovery, and up until now there hasn’t been a great deal of either, except perhaps for poor Brandy here.” An appreciative chuckle rippled up and down the table at the gentle dig. “In any case, you have all enjoyed being fed by me, and the time has come now for you to return the favour.”
With a sudden hiss, she leapt up and back, her cloak billowing outwards to form large, bat-like wings. She landed on the chair back, gripping it with prehensile toes, displaying a nakedness that was only vaguely human. Unblemished skin stretched across bone. She had breasts but no nipples, and the area between her legs was smooth and featureless.
I looked up into her face, perhaps one of the few at the table not drawn to her unusual, but oddly alluring, physique. Her eyes flashed with an inner fire, and her grin held way too many teeth. Panic gripped me and I tried to climb to my feet, to flee, but my body refused to respond.
She chuckled quietly as other faces around the table mirrored the same alarm I was feeling.
“Don’t be concerned,” she said, equally quietly. “It’s just a little something Riffraff added to the coffee – quite harmless, quite temporary. You see I have to explain my plans to you before we set about starting the evening’s entertainment, and it wouldn’t do to have all of you running about in an unseemly panic, at least not yet.”
The grin widened, the eyes burned with a deep hunger and the teeth seemed to sharpen somehow. I couldn’t speak for anyone else, but my own fear threshold was fast approaching. She turned to Riffraff who had been waiting for her signal. He was standing next to a handle in the wall behind her, and at her glance, he started turning it. With a gentle clanking, what had seemed to be ornate, wrought iron chandeliers started to lower from the high vaulted ceiling, a long vicious spike extending from the centre of each one to hang with a Damoclesian threat directly over each of our heads.
The spikes lowered to within a foot of the tops of our skulls then stopped. There was a sticky, metallic taste to the air and sparks crawled over the surface of the ironwork above us. Eight pairs of fear-widened eyes turned towards the head of the table. Struggling had achieved not the slightest movement in my limbs, and from the panicked expressions about me, I hadn’t been the only one to try and fail.
“What delights me the most is how naïve you all are,” our demon hostess continued. “You didn’t even stop to wonder how someone like me, with no connections or involvement in your school, would be given permission to post an invitation on your bulletin board. You thought that since the notice was up there, it would be alright to respond.
“But you see, no-one else could see the invitation but you. For tonight’s entertainment to work, I needed eight very specific individuals – people whose personalities fitted the costumes I had prepared. It took some doing, because I can only influence minds, never control them, but with a suggestion here, a nagging feeling there, I guided you all into making that call. And now here you are, dressed and ready to play out my little drama.
“In a few short moments it will be midnight, and the storm I have summoned will reach its peak. At the last stroke of midnight, science and mystery will marry to transform you into truer representations of personalities I see inside you, and the fun will begin. You will be released to do as seems natural to you, your only limitation being that you must remain within the confines of the castle grounds until dawn.
“Brandy and Charlie will have a small head start, because let’s face it, it won’t be much fun otherwise. Then the rest of you will have your freedom. Be warned though, when this night is over, only two of you will leave here as yourselves. Do what you must to make sure it’s you.”
Her timing was perfect. Seconds after she finished speaking, a clock in some distant hall rang out the hour, ending with twelve long, drawn out, ponderous chimes. The last was lost in an almighty crash of thunder, and brilliant blue sparks of lightning arced across from the spikes into each of us. The pain was excruciating, overriding the paralysis and causing each of us to writhe in our seats. Changes were happening, I could feel them, but the pain was everything and I ran from it to a place of empty blackness deep in my mind.
“Brandy!” I felt someone shaking me harder than anyone should have been able to. “Brandy, wake up. We have to move.”
I forced opened heavily lidded eyes and clawed my way through the curtain of auburn curls hanging in front of my face.
A pair of brilliant blue eyes gazed into mine from beneath a brow, creased in concern. As the dreamy fog lifted from my mind, I took in sensuous lips and a strong jaw, short hair, broad shoulders. I felt my body responding to the hovering figure in new, disquieting, but oddly delicious ways. It was a stranger’s face, but somehow familiar.
“Charlie?”
“Yeah, weird, I know. Now come on, we have to get out of here.”
Strong arms pulled me effortlessly to my feet. I felt strange; disorientated and different, but oddly right. I didn’t have time to explore the new sensations though, as pandemonium was breaking out all around us demanding our attention.
To my right, Damien and Amy were circling each other, hissing like two cats in heat. There was something otherworldly about them. Their pallid features seemed more naturally corpse-like than any makeup should be able to achieve, and there was a deep brooding menace about them that hadn’t existed before.
Directly across the table, Brick struggled to control limbs that jerked and spasmed as though they belonged to someone else. The scars on his face seemed real, and the bolt through his neck looked like it genuinely pass through his skin. Beside him, I caught the briefest glimpse of Lucy’s face and hands before writhing bandages obscured them. For just an instant it seemed that her flesh shrivelled and tightened across the underlying bone, taking on the desiccated appearance of old papyrus. Her eyes widened in horror, but it was me who gave voice to her scream.
Everything was becoming real. My former classmates, were being transformed into the creatures represented by their costumes, and the sight of it released some deep seated horror within me, bubbling up from my darkest, innermost depths and pouring out of my mouth in a terrified shriek.
“Yeah, like that’s going to help.” Charlie wasn’t impressed and yanked at my arm, pulling me off balance and into a stumbling run, and not a moment too soon. The voicing of my terrors seemed to grab at the attention of everyone else in the room. Everyone that is except Pete, who was tearing at the heavy curtains, staring intently out of the wide window behind them. The storm clouds parted to reveal a silvery disc. A beam of moonlight transfixed the wolfman, and drew from him a howl, more primal and terrifying than even my scream. The hairs on my back and arms rose in response, but they felt different somehow…
Malevolent eyes, so recently focused on me, turned towards Pete; all except one pair. Drusilla’s appearance was the least changed of anyone in the room. Her face and hands were no more or less white than usual, although her eyes seemed to have sunk deep into her skull, and there was something ethereal about her; I almost imagined I could see though her. Shit! I could see through her.
She opened her mouth, displaying grey teeth and blackened gums in a grimace of rage, and raised clawed hands towards me. Charlie pulled me through the door leaving me with one last fleeting glimpse of her advancing rapidly towards us through the table.
Charlie pulled the door shut behind us and leant on it, more than a hint of panic showing in his eyes.
“That’s not going to help.” I told him. Somehow, having someone to boss about helped me push my fears away. “Drew’s after us, and I rather suspect she can walk through doors.”
I tugged at his arm, dragging him into the large entrance hall, looking around at all the doors and, picking one at random, I pulled us through it. It wouldn’t give us much of a reprieve, but the few seconds it would take Drew to check all the rooms might give us the time we needed to come up with a plan.
I looked around at the room we were in. Leather armchairs faced a fire burning in the hearth, brandy and glasses were laid out on a silver tray ready for after dinner refreshments. I searched frantically for something – anything – that might serve as a weapon, but what could you use against a ghost?
An unnatural chill settled on the room despite the fire, and I spun to see Drew’s ghostly form drift through the panelled door as though it were so much smoke. She directed a spite filled grin at me and I couldn’t help letting loose another scream as I scrambled backwards into the corner of the room.
She darted forward, reaching with ghostly hands for my neck, clawing at my flesh, cutting off my air. Terror welled up in me out of control. I tried screaming again, but all I managed was a hoarse, choking whisper. I grabbed for her hands, trying to pull them away, but it was like grasping at cobwebs. Drew’s fingers continued to claw at my throat and I felt myself growing faint, the room darkening about me.
“Get your hands of her you freaking… Aargh!”
Charlie had recovered his wits and launched himself at the sepulchral figure, swinging a fist wildly at the back of her head. It passed through and smashed into the panelling beside me, barely missing me. Charlie turned away, gripping his hand in agony, but it had been enough. The shock of the blow, both the sound and the near miss, had been enough to distract me from what else was happening to me, and in the interruption, the sensation of Drew’s claw-like fingers on my throat diminished.
I stared at her in surprise and sudden realisation. She continued to scowl at me and tear at my throat, but the spell was broken. Even with the terrifying apparition in front of me, I felt my heart easing and my breathing return to normal.
“You can’t do anything to me can you?” I asked the ghost calmly. “You need me to be afraid for your tricks to work. You weren’t actually strangling me then, but scaring me to death.”
Drew renewed her attack, but to no effect. I stepped through her towards my injured companion.
“Let me have a look at that, Charlie.”
I took his hand in mine and moved the fingers gently. He winced and looked warily at the ghost which was still trying to attack me, but she was no more than the slightest distraction now, butterfly shadows flickering at the edge of my vision.
“Don’t mind her, Charlie; she can’t hurt anyone she can’t terrify. It looks like you might have broken this, let me see if I can find anything to bind it with.”
Drew continued to flail frantically, but she was fading fast. None of the room’s furnishings would serve as bandages, the curtain was too heavy and nothing else had any fabric to it. It seemed a shame to ruin such a nice dress, but I had long since lost any sense of obligation towards our hostess. I tugged at the seam until it gave and tore up about a hand’s width. I then worked at tearing off a strip from the bottom of the skirt. It didn’t want to give, but the distraction helped me to ignore Drew, and by the time I had my makeshift bandage, there was nothing left of her.
“What happened to her?” Charlie asked as I wrapped the strip of cloth around his fingers. No safety pins, so I tore the last bit down its centre until I had enough to tie it off. Charlie flexed his fingers gently and winced slightly. “It’s better, thank you. I’ll make do. Now what happened to Drew?”
“She was a ghost, probably as much in real life as she was here. Pretty much the worst thing you can do to a ghost is ignore it and pretend it doesn’t exist, because it doesn’t except that we believe in it.”
“You’re kidding. That’s it?”
“Well, it seems to have worked.”
“I guess so, but I doubt the rest will be as easy.”
“Easy! I was nearly strangled and you’ve messed up your hand.”
“Even so, I don’t think the others will disappear just because we don’t believe in them. We have to figure out how to fight them. You know, like vampires are easy. All we need is a sharp piece of wood and stab them in the heart.”
“Charlie! They’re people. Whatever this weird place has done to them, they’re still human beings underneath. We can’t kill them.”
“And just what do you think you did to Drew? I mean granted, technically a ghost is already dead, but whatever you did to make her disappear destroyed her. If we want to survive the night, we’re going to have to deal with the rest just the same.”
My subconscious had been trying to hide the fact from me, but realisation now settled on me like an icy fog. I had just killed Betty Evans. OK, she wasn’t the most likeable girl in school, and I had never had any time for her, but just because she was weird and unpopular wasn’t a reason to end her life. Granted she had been trying to kill me at the time, but there had to be another way.
“Brandy!” Charlie grabbed my shoulders and shook me. “Look, get with the program. This is live or die, for real. I know you feel badly about Drew, I do too, but we don’t have a choice. Those things will tear us apart given half a chance, and the only way we’re going to stop them is if we do it to them first. Now what can we use for stakes?”
I reluctantly agreed with him and started looking around me. Again, nothing in the room seemed suitable. The logs in the fire were too big to sharpen down easily, and all of the furniture was too bulky.
“What about your cane?” I asked.
“What, oh my stick. You’re a genius. If I break this in half, then we’ll each have a weapon.”
“Wait. What’s the handle made out of?”
“What’s the what?” He examined the cane more closely. It had a large handle shaped into a wolf’s head and made from a shiny, silvery metal.
“It looks like silver, check for a hallmark.”
It only took a minute to find it. Solid silver, and large enough to make an effective club.
“You’re thinking wolfman I take it?”
“Yes. It’ll be a better weapon if it hasn’t been shortened. You can break it down into stakes when we’re attacked by the vampires.”
“OK, three down. How are we going to deal with the other two?”
But we’d run out of time. Pete chose that moment to let out his second spine chilling howl of the night, and it sounded like it was just outside the door.
We both froze, hoping against hope that he hadn’t heard or scented us. A second later there was an almighty crash and the thick oak door seemed to leap in its frame. It would hold for a few seconds, but not many if his first assault was anything to go by.
Charlie swung his cane experimentally, the silver wolf’s head outermost. Left handed wasn’t ideal, but his right was too damaged to grip the weapon effectively.
“Get out of here, Brandy. I’ll try and hold him back.”
Shit. Why do men have to be so macho and stupid? Hang on, Charlie was my girlfriend; but he was a man now too. Crap, this was so confusing. No time to think right now. I ran over to one of the leather wing armchairs and dragged at it ineffectually. This should have been an easy heft for me, but I could barely shift it.
“Charlie, help me get this against the door.”
“Get out of here, I said.”
“I know what you said, you idiot, but for one thing there aren’t any other doors, and for another, I doubt either of us will survive long if we split up. We’re better off sticking together. Now help me shift this thing.”
There’s a certain type of man that’s easy to boss about, especially if you’re a good looking woman. Fortunately it seemed that Charlie was that kind of man and I was that kind of… Shit, I was a woman. This wasn’t just me wearing a dress, this was really me, how I’d always felt inside. The jiggling feeling I’d felt on my chest running out of the dining hall, that strangeness about the hairs on my arms… Charlie had to drag the chair over to the door single-handed. Realisation finally sunk all the way through my thick skull, and I stood, dumbfounded, checking through an internal inventory.
Boobs, check – nicely filling the cups sewn into the dress.
Nothing between the legs, check – or at least nothing that had been there earlier.
Smooth skin, check – no sign of a five o’clock shadow, and only a light fuzz elsewhere.
Slender arms and legs, no strength, long hair, finer features, narrow waist, broad hips, high pitched voice. All there. I was smaller too, and the clothes had adjusted to match. Another crash against the door shook me out of my stunned stupor. The door didn’t move as much with the chair in front of it. It would buy us a few extra seconds.
“Come on, Brandy. What are we going to do now?”
I realised Charlie had been calling me that since he’d shaken me awake in the dining room.
“I’m a girl,” I said, somewhat redundantly.
“Yeah, and a pretty hot one at that,” Charlie responded. “Can we deal with that later when there are fewer teeth about?”
My brain stuttered into life again. For the umpteenth time, I scoured the room for anything that would help. Instinct took over and I grabbed the decanter of brandy and threw it at the door. It smashed with the kind of expensive sound reserved for fine lead crystal, spraying its contents all over. I ran for the fire and used the tongs to launch one of the smaller logs in the same direction. Flames flared, engulfing both chair and door. Chances were it wouldn’t spread through the stonework of the castle, but if Pete had any normal animal instincts it might keep him back a while longer.
“Great,” Charlie said. “Now we’re trapped in a burning room with the only exit on fire.”
You just can’t please some people. I glanced around the room again, hauled at the heavy drapes to reveal the same sort of leaded glass windows we’d seen in the other rooms. I picked up the table that had recently held the brandy, spilling the tray and glasses onto the floor. It wasn’t as light as I had hoped, and I struggled to lift it. The throw was the epitome of girlyness, barely reaching the window and bouncing off it without making much of an impression. Charlie got the idea though, and swung the table with considerably more force.
The windows were genuinely leaded, not the modern lead lined effect over a complete pane of toughened glass. The lead strips tore away and diamond shaped shards scattered outwards into the garden. Charlie offered me a hand up onto the window sill. I wasn’t about to object given the awkwardness of my shoes. It would have been easier to move without them, but leaping barefoot onto the remains of the window seemed the height of stupidity.
Another crash and a panel in the door gave way. A howl of pain quickly followed as tongues of flame licked at the furry face that appeared in the gap. I leapt, landing on the balls of my feet and managing to turn my excess momentum into a stumbling run. Charlie was close behind me, grabbing my hand as he sped past, leading me towards the cars.
We reached my trusty – no make that rusty – old runabout and I fumbled in my bag for the keys, passing them to Charlie. Yeah, I know it was my car, but at such a time it seemed sensible to have someone with strength and focus behind the wheel. Besides, I didn’t trust myself to drive safely, either in heels or stockinged feet.
The car roared into life with a second twist of the keys. Charlie jammed it into reverse and swung out onto the gravel drive. A quick gear change and we sped off towards the entrance, leaving a spray of stones to discourage anyone chasing us.
A winged shape swooped past us through the rain, so fast I almost missed it. On another night, I would have dismissed it as overactive imaginings, but after what we’d seen and experienced in the last few minutes…
The gates loomed in the headlights as Charlie sped on. A figure swooped out of the sky to land directly in our path, folding bat wings into a cloak and holding out hands as if to stop us. Charlie jammed his foot down on the accelerator; this was one game of chicken we couldn’t lose.
We were wrong. The car hit our demon hostess, but instead of running her over or knocking her out the way, she managed somehow to grab hold of the front of the car and force it off the drive into a low hedge. We skidded to a halt without causing much damage to either the vehicle or ourselves, but the car was wedged tight and wouldn’t be going anywhere without the help of a tow truck.
“I said you were to remain within the castle grounds.” She hovered over us, bat wings flapping furiously to hold her more or less in place. “Try and leave again before dawn and I won’t be so gentle.”
As if to accentuate her words, a brilliant bolt of lightning arced out of the sky, crashing with deafening thunder into the wrought iron gates behind her, melting them into twisted confusion.
We climbed out of the car, the driving rain soaking us in an instant as it had before. Lights from the castle appeared dim and diffused through the downpour. We needed shelter, even if it was filled with ravening, B movie monsters.
I leaned against the car to remove my shoes, and an instant later Charlie grabbed me round the waist and pulled me away. My protesting cry was cut short though, when an enormous arm came crashing down on the roof of the vehicle, crumpling it like so much paper.
I scrambled to my feet, pausing only to throw my shoes at Brick’s hulking figure, looming out of the rain. They bounce ineffectually off his chest. Charlie grabbed my arm and pulled me into a run again, across the gravel drive – sharp stones cutting into my unprotected feet – and back towards the shelter and comparative safety of the castle.
We found a servant’s entrance in the side of the building. It was locked, but not that secure. A couple of shoulder barges from Charlie’s well-muscled form and the door gave. We staggered into the dry, feeling about for a light switch in the gloom. A flash of lightning showed stone stairs leading up, but otherwise bare walls. Charlie had been looking back towards the door when lightning flared, but had no better luck then me. Far worse luck in fact.
“Get behind me,” he said with an urgency that brooked no dissent. I did as instructed, feeling my knees weaken at the low growl that came from outside. Charlie still had his stick with him, and was brandishing the silver end at the menacing silhouette in the doorway.
Another flash of lighting – thunder crashing simultaneously overhead – gave us a brief glimpse of singed fur and an evil look that went far beyond simply predatory. I clamped my hands to my mouth to hold in yet another scream, and backed up the stairs.
Slow careful movements. Pete followed as we retreated, becoming harder to see as the shadows deepened, his glowing amber eyes the only clue to his whereabouts. I backed into a door and turned, fumbling for the handle. It was open and I tumbled out into a well-lit, but bare, corridor. Pete winced away from the light giving Charlie his chance to turn and run. He slammed the door and grabbed my arm, towing me along behind him.
A door to our left. Grab the handle, barge. Locked. Run on. Noises of pursuit from behind. Don’t look, it’ll only slow you down. If it’s going to get you, looking will only make it happen quicker. Another door to the left. Unlocked. Charlie pulled it open and dragged me through, hauling it closed as our pursuer crashed into it. No key. It wouldn’t hold him for long.
Another corridor, but this time lined with carpet and tapestry. We were back in the main living quarters. Half a dozen doors to choose from. Don’t take the closest; that’ll be too obvious. The third one on the right led to a large room lined with suits of armour and swords, maces and muskets, rifles and revolvers. The weaponry becoming more modern the deeper into the room we went. All of the blades and spikes seem to be made of iron or steel, but then silver isn’t an ideal material for weaponry; not unless you’re fighting werewolves. I grabbed a revolver off its bracket and slid out the cylinder. Empty. Hardly likely to be that easy, but worth the look even so.
The door flew open to reveal the menacing figure of Pete the wolfman. Muscles rippling, teeth bared, claws extended.
“How did he find us so quickly?” I yelled at Charlie. He had already taken position between me and the snarling creature.
“Your feet,” he shouted back. “Footprints in the carpet, you’re bleeding.”
I lifted a foot to check, and sure enough the tiny cuts from the gravel were oozing blood. Maybe that’s what guided him to us so swiftly when we returned to the castle. No time to do anything about it now.
Pete threw himself at Charlie, only to receive a solid blow in the side of the head from the silver tipped cane. He yelped and spun off to land on all fours, facing his quarry. With a snarl, he launched himself again, this time too fast for Charlie to react. They tumbled onto the floor, the stick between them the only protection from snapping jaws and swiping claws.
“Get out of here. Run while you can.” Charlie’s voice was desperate. He had given up fighting for himself and was trying to buy me a few seconds.
Adrenaline coursed through my veins and I fought the panic that sought to overwhelm me. I wasn’t about to run. Not courage you understand; there was no way I would survive the night on my own.
A small display table caught my eye. Flintlock pistols and a powder horn. Now what were the chances?
I grabbed the horn and felt something shift inside. I pulled the stopper and poured out a few grains of course black powder. No way this should be here, but maybe the demoness felt we needed something to give us a fighting chance.
I grabbed the nearest pistol, pulled back the hammer all the way. The pan was closed so I took a chance, moved in close and squeezed the trigger, eyes closed, head turned away.
The action released, but there was no sound. No explosion, no smoke, no ball. The damn thing was empty. Well I’d half expected it, and this was marginally better than having the whole thing explode on me with a double charge.
I stepped back and poured in what I hoped was an appropriate amount of powder. Bullets, bullets. Where were the bullets. Come on Brandy, where would you find silver bullets in a place like this? I spun my head from side to side feeling unfamiliar weight on my earlobes.
I pulled off one of my earrings. It was roughly spherical and just a little smaller than the barrel of the gun. No time to check, just hope it really was silver. Another strip of delicate fabric from my dress served as wadding and the piece of jewellery fit neatly into the barrel. Ramrod out, tamp it firmly down. Fumbling, glove encased fingers dropped the rod as I pulled it out. Forget it; no time to pick it up. Charlie was struggling and shouting for me to run still, and managing, just, to fend off his attacker. He was weakening though, I had to hurry.
Half cock. Powder into the pan, not too much. Flip down the cover and pull back to full cock. Move in close. Pete looked up and snarled as I aimed. Close eyes, turn away. I didn’t want to, but I couldn’t help it. Squeeze the trigger. This time there was a response. A flash of heat, an explosion and the gun bucked violently in my hand.
Silence, but that may just be temporary deafness after the explosion. I was shaking and I couldn’t open my eyes. Strong arms took hold of me, pulling me into a gentle embrace. I started crying uncontrollably, leaning into Charlie’s firm chest, his soft murmuring and gentle stroking of my hair coaxed the tears into full flow.
It wasn’t long before the tension and the terror faded and I twisted around in Charlie’s arms to look. Pete lay sprawled on his back, all signs of the wolfman gone from him and a small round hole in his forehead. Blood and brains were sprayed out behind him where the makeshift bullet had shattered and blown out the back of his head. I buried my face back in Charlie’s shoulder, gasping and fighting back the tears.
“You had no choice.” Charlie’s voice was gentle, soothing. “It wasn’t Pete who attacked us. It was a monster, and it would have killed me, and you too, if you hadn’t got there first.”
All my nervous energy was seeping away. The gun slipped from my weakened fingers and I shivered as I became aware of how cold I was, soaked through and leaning into an equally soaked embrace. My teeth started to chatter, prompting Charlie to action.
“We need to get out of these wet things again,” Charlie told me as he tore more strips of cloth off my ever-shortening dress and used them to bind my feet. “I don’t know if the things we came in are dry yet, but even if not, there has to be something else we can wear upstairs.”
I let Charlie’s strong arm to guide me out of the room and away from the gory remains of my latest victim. The worst horror of tonight wasn’t the monsters that were chasing us, but the realisation that I had killed. Not once, but twice now. A hollow deadness settled inside me and a listlessness took over my mind.
Outside in the corridor, we were greeted by a low moan, like a dry wind through a deserted graveyard. At the far end of the corridor, Lucy’s mummified body stumbled slowly towards us
“For crying out loud,” Charlie exclaimed, “give us a break!”
It took a few moments to realise just how slowly Lucy was advancing towards us. We glanced at each other and burst out laughing. It was more hysteria than humour, but it was a much needed release.
“You know,” I managed through chattering teeth, “if I weren’t so cold, I’d suggest we wait a bit, give her a sporting chance.”
Charlie had to bite back a smile. By no stretch of the imagination could it be said that Lucy was terrifying. She did had grown somewhat, though that may have been largely a perspective shift due to my diminished stature. Whatever the case, her unsteady gait wasn’t likely threaten anyone who could manage a brisk walk. On the down side, she was between us and the stairs up to our rooms. I tried to gauge the gap between her and corridor wall; maybe we could slip past her.
“I wouldn’t recommend that.” The voice came from behind us, prompting us to turn. Our creepshow hostess from hell stood quietly, wrapped in her cloak of wings and smiling at some private joke. “You see, like you, I always thought the mummy was a bit of a pathetic monster, so I gave her a little bit extra. She may be slow, but you saw what those bandages did to her when they wrapped up her face and hands. They’ll age anything they touch by ten thousand years, so however slow and uncoordinated she may be, you’d better make sure she doesn’t touch you, even briefly.”
My blood turned to ice at the thought. One touch and whatever she came in contact with would fall to dust. The stones were safe, and possibly some metals, but anything organic, from doors and furniture to arms and legs would crumble into nothing at the least stroke.
No prospect of dodging past her then; the risk was too high. I turned to grab Charlie’s hand and led him in the opposite direction, pushing past Lady Freak-show and trying doors as I went.
They were all dead ends and next to useless to us. The first was a music room which had, amongst other things, a silver flute that might have offered some protection against Pete, had we still needed it. Next was a dress fitting room with garments in different stages of completion hanging on tailor’s dummies. Rather incongruous given our hostess’s preference of wrapping herself in her own skin.
A few of the dresses were near enough finished, with a couple in what looked like my size. Lucy was still some way down the corridor, so I dragged Charlie into the room and stripped out of the soaking tatters I was wearing. Of the two in my size, I took the one nearest. The bodice was tight fitting, with long arms, meaning I could finally get rid of the ridiculous gloves. The skirts were long and full, most likely intended to be worn with crinoline petticoats, but at least it was warm and dry. There was a larger dress which looked like it would fit Charlie. I offered it to him, but he declined.
“Why not? You used to be a girl until earlier this evening. Would you rather catch pneumonia?”
“Yes I would. For one thing, I’ve already been transformed once this evening by the clothes I was given to wear, and I don’t want to risk whatever that thing might change me into. For another, I never was a girly girl. Never did like dresses.
“Come on, the walking train-wreck is catching us up.”
He grabbed my arm and hauled me out into the corridor again, Lucy was just ten feet away. Too close for comfort. I threw the dress I had offered to Charlie at her and sure enough, it exploded into a cloud of fine dust on contact with her bandaged hands.
The next room was a study, with desks and a few shelves of books. The next was a library, filled from floor to ceiling with shelves of reading material – everywhere except the doorway we had opened, the window and an adjoining door into the study.
Next and last was a bathroom, complete with toilet, sink, and Winchester bath, standing on cast iron feet and hidden behind a full surround shower curtain.
“We are screwed,” Charlie said to no-one in particular, but looking at the tiny window I could see his point. Even my much reduced frame wasn’t going to fit through there.
An idea sparked. “No we’re not,” I said grabbing a double handful of shower curtain and yanking.
“Shower curtain. Made from vinyl. Not going to decompose very quickly. Throw it over Lucy, it’ll give us a few seconds.”
“Great idea.” He grabbed and pulled with me ’til it came loose in our hands.
He passed his stick to me and gathered up the curtain, preceded me back out into the corridor. Limping Lucy was already past the library door, so this was our only chance. Charlie threw the curtain and yelled at me to run. It worked but only just. Some plastics have quite a short half-life and vinyl, it seems, is one of them. It took no more than five seconds to break the curtain down to shreds and a further five seconds for the shreds to crumble to dust. It was enough time, but only just. I felt Lucy’s hand make contact with my shoulder as I dashed past, and just managed to duck and twist out of her reach before the plastic protecting me from her fingers broke apart. That was too close.
Charlie pulled open the door to the library and ducked in. I was only seconds behind slamming it closed behind me.
“That didn’t go quite as planned,” Charlie said, breathing a little too heavily.
“Yeah,” I replied. “Oops. Still it worked.”
“Yeah, now what?”
“Through into the study.”
We charged for the joining door. I let Charlie go first in case it needed a bit of brute force and ignorance, but there was no need, it was unlocked. We ran through it just as the seasoned oak behind us began to warp and rot.
Door closed, we crept over to the door back out to the corridor and waited. Mummies aren’t known for their intelligence, perhaps as a result of having their brains scooped out and placed into canopic jars, but there was nothing to say whether Lucy still had her smarts after her unusual transformation. Apparently not; the adjoining door behind us began to buckle; she was following us blindly.
We rushed out into the corridor and ran as fast as we could. All the while I was terrified of meeting one of the other horrors. I still had Charlie’s stick, so we still had access to stake material. The corridor was clear though, as were the stairs. Charlie bounded up them three at a time, leaving me behind to struggle with the voluminous folds of my latest costume.
I caught up with him outside our rooms, trying to make up his mind about something.
“Look, I think we should swap rooms. I don’t know if there will be any more clothes in the wardrobes, but whatever’s there, the stuff in my room will fit you better and the stuff in yours will be more my size. I don’t mean to be weird about this, but…”
“No, it sounds like a good idea. If my clothes aren’t dry, you may find yourself wearing a dress even so.”
He grimaced at the thought, and I couldn’t help but smile.
“You’re really into this aren’t you? Being a guy I mean?”
“Yeah, same as you’re loving the whole girl thing. I mean here we are being chased all over the place by monsters and you’ve already managed one change of clothes.”
It wasn’t the greatest joke, but we needed some relief from the stresses the night had brought us, so we shared more of a laugh than it deserved, leaning in close to each other until a distinct kissing opportunity presented itself. I looked up into his deep blue eyes and felt myself melt inside. I was about to kiss a guy, as a girl. Not just any guy either; one who until all to recently had been my girlfriend. He was gorgeous, and I bit at my lip as I allowed myself to feel attracted to another man for the first time in my life. No, not another man, a man. I no longer fit the category. This felt so right, but then he stepped back and moved his head to one side, refusing to meet my eyes.
It hurt that he would turn away from me like that, but I guess the situation was more than a little confusing for both of us.
“I-I’d better go see if there’s anything dry to, er, wear.” He pushed open the door to my room and disappeared inside. Noises from downstairs reminded me we were still on the clock, so I slipped into hers – his – whatever.
Charlie had been wearing jeans and a sweatshirt when we arrived. They were hanging over the back of a chair and still damp enough for me not to want to put them on. I was glad, as I preferred the feel of the dress, the way it swirled around my legs, the way it looked, enhancing my newly feminine features.
A quick look in the wardrobe confirmed it to be empty, which meant Charlie’s only option next door was my damp clothing. There was a good chance that my shirt and chinos had dried out better, being made of thinner fabric, and they would most likely be better than the soaking suit he was wearing.
I caught sight of my reflection in the mirror and sauntered over to give myself a closer examination. The dress did need petticoats; the skirt hung all wrong. Apart from that though, everything else looked good. I cupped my breasts and weighed them in my hands. They were a little small, but I was just glad to have them at all. From there, I traced out the curves of my waist and hips, enjoying the feel of soft skin under soft fabric. My hair was a mess of tangled curls, soaking from the rain, and my eyes were puffy from crying. With a little care and something to take the red and the shine from my nose, I could be quite pretty I thought. The discovery excited me, turning my insides into jelly. I smiled, nibbling absently on my lip as I examined each pore, getting used to my new face.
A hand settled onto my shoulder and I spun round.
“Hi Charlie, that was qui…”
I didn’t finish the sentence, because it wasn’t Charlie. In retrospect the lack of reflection ought to have been a clue.
“Damien?” I stepped back nervously out of his reach, then found my courage. “Where’s your bitch queen?”
“There is no Damien.” The voice was languid, hypnotic. Despite my initial fear and fighting spirit, I felt my will draining away. His eyes were violet, intense, commanding, and I fell under their spell in a moment. It wasn’t like it had been with Charlie, but there were some similarities. I felt myself giving into the will of this creature. He was right, this wasn’t Damien. It wore his face, more or less, but deep within was an intensity of purpose, of hunger that leached at the will. “And my queen, she is next door seeing to your friend. We have an understanding. I like my meat soft and tender,” he moved in close, breathing the words into my ear, “she prefers a more lively meal. So she allows me my pleasures, and I allow her hers.”
A soft, well-manicured hand stroked my jaw, dropped to touch the high lace collar on the dress.
“But you have such exquisite skin. Why would you hide it beneath such mediocre trappings as these?”
“Huh?” It was the most intelligent thing I could think to say. My skin was beautiful. I shouldn’t be hiding it. I reached behind my neck to undo the clasp, to push the zip down a few inches then, twisting around, I reached up from under my arms to pull it down even further. He smiled his encouragement, showing such glorious white teeth and fangs. There was nothing of love or affection in his eyes, just hunger. And I was to be his meal. How glorious to be given such a privilege.
I tugged at the sleeves and let the dress slip to the floor, tilting my head to one side, allowing him free access to my jugular. I breathed deeply and sighed in anticipation…
There was a sharp hiss and he shied away from me, covering his face and eyes with his cloak. I snapped out of my trance to see, not the beautiful and masterful being that had so drawn me in, but a cowering monster, a self-serving evil, shrinking from some ancient power that even it couldn’t master. I stared down at my chest, at the silver cross nestled between my breasts. Had that thing just saved my life? Not yet.
Charlie’s stick was leaning against the chair next to her damp clothes. I darted for it, grabbed it in both hands and brought it down hard across the back of the chair, breaking it cleanly into two sharpened lengths.
The creature had moved – impossibly fast – to stand between me and the door. Trying to prevent my escape, but I was done with screaming and running. Anatomy class don’t fail me now. Just to the right of the sternum as I was looking at it, and just below the level of the nipples. I hurled myself forward, brandishing one sharpened sliver of wood in two hands, yelling my defiance.
I must have caught him by surprise, because he stood transfixed as half a cane pierced his clothing and skin to slide between two ribs and bury itself in the muscle beneath. How I found the strength to drive it home, I have no idea, but I did. He hissed defiance at me as he fell backwards. I fell with him, driving the stake even deeper as I landed on him. He spasmed, back arched, fingers clawed, then lay still.
I stood slowly. There was no neat explosion of dust, instead, Damien lay there in his vampire costume, very real blood soaking into his shirt. More death. More life blood on my hands. But I couldn’t stop there. I grabbed the other half of Charlie’s stick and ran for her door.
She was poised ready to strike, Charlie kneeling in front of her, head leaning to one side, that familiar, dreamy longing reflected in his eyes. I grabbed my cross and held it up for her to see. She hissed and shrank away. I threw myself at her as I had her partner, brandishing my makeshift stake, but without the element of surprise, she was too fast. She turned away and rushed with superhuman speed at the window, shattering it as she leapt through. From somewhere, she grew wings and flew off into the dark.
“Charlie, are you alright?” I knelt beside him, supporting his considerable weight as he snapped out of his own trance. He wavered a little, then his eyes turned straight for my cleavage, proving once and for all his underlying maleness.
“Whoa, a little under-dressed for the weather aren’t we, sweetheart?”
I looked down at myself. Bra and panties, torn stockings and strips of my earlier dress around me feet.
“I guess I can’t blame you for your reaction then.” We fell back on our haunches, laughing out the renewed tension.
A noise from the doorway drew our attention and we turned to see the door buckle and break under Lucy’s touch. Once again there was no way out, unless we fancied jumping twenty feet onto broken glass.
I should have been scared, but I’d had enough of being chased. Instead a I felt a blood red rage well up inside me. I jumped back to my feet and grabbed the quilted cover from the bed, throwing it with some hidden reserve of strength clear across the room. It burst into a cloud of dust the moment it touched Lucy, but I was already running for the fireplace. Most of the logs from earlier in the evening had burnt down to glowing embers, but a few flames still danced on charred branches. I grabbed one with my bare hands, ignoring the searing pain, and hurled it across the room.
The dust from the quilt ignited and the room erupted in a fireball, like an explosion in a flour mill. Charlie had been close behind me and threw himself on top of me, protecting me from the worst of the flames, his own sodden clothes providing him with some protection in turn.
The flame was short lived, but it left behind a keening, desperate figure, staggering back and forth as it was engulfed in its own private inferno. Charlie continue to hold me tight to him, sparing me the sight of Lucy’s last moments, and clinging to me still for some minutes after she was gone.
A slow hand clap from the broken window brought us back to ourselves. Doctor Francescanstein, or who or whatever she was, stood just inside the shattered frame, wings outspread, flaunting her nakedness, and radiating sheerest delight.
“Bravo, this is truly a most excellent evening. I have never known victims to compete so well. Less than two hours gone and you’ve already dispatched four of your nemeses. You shall have to slow down or we’ll have a whole night to while away.
“I like the new look by the way, très risqué.”
I grabbed the towel I’d used to dry myself earlier, and wrapped up my modesty as best I could.
“What is this?” I yelled at her. “You turn our friends into monsters, force us to kill them. I mean, what kind of sick perverted joke is this?”
“Your friends? Really?”
“They go to our school. We know them. OK, so their idiots, so what? It doesn’t mean they deserve to die!”
“Interesting too, how you talk about their transformation and not yours. I picked you well, Brandy, I really did.”
“Well it ends now. No more killing.”
“Is that so? I wonder if you’ll feel the same when you come across a vampire sucking the last drop of blood from your boyfriend’s veins, or when the greatest creation to emerge from the realm of science tears this castle down stone by stone to get to you. You have very little choice in this matter, Brandy. Only two of my guests will share tonight’s prize. All you get to decide is whether those two are Charles and yourself, or Frankenstein’s creation and a recently widowed vampire. There will be a deciding confrontation between you, you have no control over that, though you may yet have a say in when and where.”
“What is your purpose here? Why are you doing this?”
“I am here to observe, my dear, and to enjoy. The answer serves both questions.”
She dropped through the window and disappeared, much as Amy the vampire had done. It was still raining and cold, and a towel was barely enough protection against such elements. I headed back to Charlie’s room in search of warm clothes.
Charlie knocked on my door and came through at my beckoning. I wore the dress from the fitting room again, only this time with my cross outside the collar. A search of drawers in the room had unearthed a pair of scissors and I was busy putting them to use, cutting away the tattered ends of the stockings and the DIY bandages he had put on my feet. I had hung Charlie’s socks and trainers in front of the dying embers of the fire, close enough to absorb some of the heat, but not so close they would burn.
Charlie had changed into my old clothes and they fit him pretty well. They were still a little damp, but better than the suit he had been given, the back of which was seared and tattered from the eruption of mount Ves-Lucy-us.
I retrieved the socks and shoes from their place by the fire and slid my unbound feet into them. The fit was surprisingly comfortable, even though the overall effect was a bit Lily Allen. I stood as Charlie approached, a little closer than normal.
“Outside the door earlier,” he started, then faltered, the words stuttering to halt. “It’s just that… This is all so new to me, like it is to you, I’m sure. I didn’t know what to do, whether you wanted me to, whether I wanted to even… But now, I – I – I er…”
I’d seen this before, been on the other side of it sometimes. It was going to end badly unless… I reached up and kissed him. Not for long, but enough to answer some of the uncertainty he was feeling. He took me in his arms and pressed his lips against mine. You’d have thought that someone who’d spent their entire life as a girl would understand the value of gentleness in a kiss. I had to push him away, then pull him more slowly into my own embrace. My lips weren’t too bruised from his exuberance, so the next kiss was much more enjoyable.
When we were done, I held myself close against his broad chest and allowed myself to feel safe for a while. I needed it. No words necessary. It seemed strange that Charlie had been as envious of me being a man as I had of her being a woman. Now things were right and it felt so good to be held in his strong arms. I wondered if he felt as good holding me. I hoped so.
“So what do we do now?” he asked, easing me away from him so he could look into my eyes.
“I don’t know. I’m not sure I can face any more death tonight. I’d like to find somewhere we can barricad
e ourselves in and wait out the dawn, but I doubt there’s anywhere in the castle where we can do that.”
“We could try to reason with them.”
“If it were Brick and Amy, maybe, but it’s not them. We’re up against a near mindless killing machine with the capability of tearing down this entire castle with its bare hands, and a vampire widow who’s most likely looking to avenge her significant other’s death. I doubt there will be much dialogue possible with either of them.”
“So what does that leave us?”
“We can go out looking for them, or we can sit back and wait for them to come to us. Either way we need to be prepared.”
“I mean we’ve had our encounters with them both. Brick is immensely strong, but seems to be a little slow, both in the head and the limbs. We can maybe use that against him. Amy’s the tricky one though. She knows about my cross and she knows we have a stake we’re not afraid to use. For our part, we know she can put either of us in a trance if she catches us with our guard down, and we know she can fly. Now that we’ve exchanged blows for the first time, I doubt we’ll be able to get the drop on her any more than she can on us.”
“So where does that leave us?”
“Well for one thing, sooner or later the lady vampire is going to realise that she doesn’t actually have to drink us dry in order to kill us, at which point her strength and speed are going to become a serious problem for us.”
“Any good news?”
“We need to get creative, and we need a few extra bits in our armoury, for which I think we shall need enlist the help of our friend, Riffraff.”
“You seriously trust that snake? He’s as much a part of this mess as the demon lady is.”
“I know, but he has a few bits of information that we need.”
I grabbed the bell pull by the fireplace and gave it a solid tug. The distant bell had barely stopped jangling before the door creaked slowly open to reveal Doctor Francescanstein’s oddly misshapen servant. He was holding a broom and a large dustpan filled with a course grey ash.
“You rang, miss?” He smiled at me, very slightly emphasising the female title. His expression held something subtly subversive, like that of a waiter who spits in the coffee of customers he dislikes. The warfare of the conquered, fighting back in ways imperceptible to their masters, feeding their own diminished courage and dissent without prompting a response from those they were forced to serve.
“Hello Riffraff,” I ignored his gentle rancour. “Do you know where there is a map of this castle and its grounds?”
“I do, miss.” Again the slight emphasis as though he felt he could upset me by pointing out what had been done to me. He bowed and turned to leave. I knew this game.
“Would you please show it to us?”
He paused, stiffening slightly. “Of course miss.”
He led us through deserted corridors to a room filled with display cabinets. He indicated one which held a hand drawn map in medieval style, mixing two and three dimensional drawings, and almost totally lacking in accuracy.
“Is there nothing more recent?”
“No need, miss, the castle hasn’t changed in a great many years. Now if you will excuse me.” He bowed – little more than a nod in all truth – and shuffled off with his broom and dustpan full of ash.
I remembered being good with maps, but this one was confusing. Charlie eased me gently to one side, staring at it intently.
“OK, it looks like we’re here.” He pointed at a spot on the map that looked like pretty much every other spot. “What are we looking for?”
I told him, and he spent a few minutes more scouring the chart before pointing out the places I wanted.
“Can you get us to them?” He nodded. “OK, kitchen first.”
We set off to make our own preparations.
Our exploration of the castle took us back to the armoury where, being less pressed than last time, I made a short detour to the fitting room. A brief search uncovered a drawer full of crinoline petticoats and I took what I needed to make the dress I was wearing bell out and sit right. The heavy material of the skirts had been tangling my legs and slowing me down, so the added undergarments made movement easier as well as improving the look of the dress.
It took us a while, but we found everything we were looking for. I still wasn’t ready to go hunting for our former schoolmates, and neither was Charlie. Instead we set up a sort of defensive camp in the central court of the castle – a large open space with a covered well at its centre. The rain had stopped, and the clearing skies overhead all but invited an airborne attack from Amy. Arrogance has always been a weakness of vampires and I hoped Amy would be overconfident. As for Brick, I didn’t expect the surrounding stonework to keep him out, but it would at least slow him down a little and provide us with some warning of his arrival.
Charlie and I sat down on the raised wall around the well and settled in to wait. The night was turning cold and I shivered despite the warm dress. Charlie took it as an invitation to shuffle closer and put his arm around me. It wasn’t much warmer, but I was grateful for the comfort it provided and I leaned in on his shoulder.
“So,” Charlie said, “who’d have thunk it? You and me pretending to be what we were on the outside and all the while wanting to be each other.”
I snorted by way of a laugh. There’s a difference between being big and strong enough to protect yourself and wanting someone big and strong around to protect you. I’d hated the loneliness of being a guy, acting tough while all the time I was crying a little inside – dying a little. Feeling strong arms around me fulfilled a need in me. I missed my old strength, but only a bit. Having to rely on Charlie drew me closer to him, made me appreciate him more.
“You don’t mind being a man then?” I had to ask. If this was an exchange, I needed to know that he was getting a fair deal.
“Are you kidding? All that bright, bubbly, bouncy stuff? That was just a show, me trying to fit in as a girl and probably overcompensating, because it was so far from what I wanted to be. I’ve never been attracted to guys, except you that is, and I could never figure that out before tonight. I never realised you were playing for the other team, like me.”
Sports metaphors. Well that settled it. If he was going to ogle my breasts any time I gave him the opportunity and try and explain things with sports analogies, then there could be no doubt he was really a guy inside. I resigned myself to a future standing on the side-lines of some pitch watching him and a couple of dozen other guys chase after a pig’s bladder in some form or another. It would be a small enough price to show my love and support.
Yeah, for real. I loved this guy. I’d had a fondness for her as Charlie-girl, but had been too wrapped up in my own sense of wrongness to appreciate it. Now I felt drawn to him in a way I’d never experienced before.
“So I take it you don’t mind being a girl?”
I shook my head and snuggled closer. “This is what I’ve been missing all my life. I fit into this so much better, especially with you here.”
He kissed me on the top of the head. All the reassurance I needed.
“Wait till your monthly visitor comes along; you may feel differently then.”
“I don’t think so. I mean, sure it’s not nice, but it’s part of being a woman, and that’s all I’ve ever wanted to be, right from my earliest memories.”
We lapsed into silence, sharing the peace of the moment as distantly grumbling clouds gave way to an increasingly clear sky. The moon was high and full, outshining all but the brightest stars and painting the castle walls in pale shades of grey.
The shadow of a pair of wings raced across the ground.
“I think we’re up,” Charlie said, continuing with his pseudo-sports speak.
We stayed still, waiting, tension building. How do you track a creature that has no reflection, that can move in complete silence? She would find it difficult to attack through the well structure, and we were counting on her arrogance to move around into our direct line of sight, to taunt us with our helplessness before she took her revenge. I dipped a hand into the bucket beside me and splashed water on Charlie’s neck, then did the same to myself, soaking the high lace collar. It was cold, but I had my reasons.
“Are you ready to die?” It wasn’t quite Amy’s voice – too devoid of emotion, even for her.
We stood and turned to face her, Charlie brandishing a large brass cross we had found in the castle’s chapel.
She hissed, but more with anger than fear. “You know those have little enough effect on us if we are ready, and the garlic is a laughable myth.”
The garlic we’d found in the kitchen and it had seemed worth the effort of hanging a few bulbs around our necks. Garlic has antiseptic properties and probably gained its reputation as a ward against evil from its medicinal uses, so I hadn’t been counting on it as more than a distraction.
She dashed forward, so fast neither of us could see. I caught a glimpse of her gleaming fangs as she brought them down on Charlie’s exposed neck.
An instant later, she jerked her head back, hissing in surprise and rage. I swung the bucket up and doused her with a face full of water, causing her to stagger back further, screaming as her skin bubbled and burst. Charlie picked up the sword from where it had been leaning in the shadows beside the well and I ducked out the way as he swung it round in one long, vicious arc.
A moment later we were looking down on Amy’s decapitated body.
“I was worried there for a moment,” Charlie said, the false nonchalance hiding the growing horror that was evident in his eyes.
“Yeah, me too. I didn’t know if the bucket would defile the holy water or something. Let me look at your neck.”
Blood trickled from two tiny pinpricks, but the bite hadn’t penetrated deeply enough to puncture the artery. I kissed the tiny wound, there being little more necessary to fix it.
“I never realised…” Charlie was still staring at Amy’s corpse.
“Yeah, I know, but like you said to me, you didn’t have a choice. It wasn’t Amy when it attacked and it would have killed you if you hadn’t killed it first. It doesn’t make it any more right though. Being responsible for someone’s death kills something inside, even if she attacked you, and you acted in self-defence. Her blood’s on her hands though, and those of the creature who started all this. She wouldn’t be dead if she hadn’t tried to kill us first, and she wouldn’t have tried to kill us if she hadn’t been turned into that thing.”
“It’s not much.”
“I know. I’m sorry, love.”
“Yeah, me too. I wish I’d never thought of coming to this party.”
“No! Don’t go there. You had no idea this was going to happen. None of us did, which makes us all victims.”
The anger was a surprising new thing. Doctor Francescanstein was responsible for all of this. Her transformation of everyone, her taking away the will of those she’d turned into monsters. It was her fault. It would never assuage the guilt either of us felt for the killings, but it helped to ease the full burden.
We returned to our vigil by the well. There were no words to fill the silence now as we sat leaning against each other, holding each other’s hands. Death was something we shared in common now. Causing it, living with the consequences.
Riffraff limped into the courtyard, threw Amy’s body over his shoulder and picked up her head by its hair.
“Always some mess to clear up,” he muttered loud enough for us to hear. “Meddling kids, hah!”
The moonlight cast strange shadows on his face so it was hard to be sure, but his mouth seemed to be twisted into some semblance of a smile. It only added to the strangeness of the night, and the weight of the guilt we both felt. This transformation Charlie and I had undergone may have been an answer to an impossible dream, but the cost was too high, and it wasn’t all paid yet.
Silence descended and time passed, minutes blurring into hours. The moon and stars moved across the sky as we watched, huddled together for warmth. In time, the nervous energy which had been keeping us going drained away and we drifted into a light sleep. From time to time, one of us would jerk awake at some innocent night sound or, more commonly as we began to lose balance. After the third or fourth time, Charlie decided we needed to do something about it. He settled me on the ground, leaning against the well’s low wall, and covered me with his jacket. My dress was already quite warm enough, but it didn’t seem right to object, so I thanked him and made him promise to wake me in an hour or two if nothing else had happened. It wasn’t long after that I fell into a deeper sleep.
The next thing I remember was startling awake to a loud crash. I jumped to my feet and looked around to find Charlie brandishing his sword and facing the remains of the portcullis that guarded the entrance to the courtyard. In the deep shadows of the archway I could see an immense figure approaching.
“Charlie, don’t. He’s too strong for you.”
It was no use. He was either ignoring me or so focused on facing this last monster that he couldn’t register my words. The creature that had once been Brick Buckley stepped into the moonlight and paused to roar. It was fully two feet taller than Brick’s already impressive six foot something, and broader in the shoulders, arms, legs, everything.
“Charlie, please!” I yelled at the top of my voice, but he remained oblivious.
Voicing his own roar, he charged, swinging the sword with all his strength towards the monster’s neck, but he might as well have been hitting a tank with a stick. Brick grabbed the flashing sword by its blade and pulled it effortlessly from Charlie’s grasp. A second, equally nonchalant swing of an arm sent him flying across the courtyard to crash into a wooden barn like structure built against one of the outer walls.
The monster lumbered after its quarry, evidently possessing enough presence of mind to finish one victim before turning to the next. Having seen what Brick had done to the roof of my car, I knew Charlie wouldn’t survive a similar blow, so I ran at the creature, yelling a screaming.
It was enough. Brick turned towards me and charged with alarming speed. I turned and ran, almost tripping on the folds of my clothing, but grateful all the same for Charlie’s trainers. I could hear thundering footsteps bearing down on me and dived to one side just as the creature careened past me.
Cursing the long dress, I scrambled to me feet and ran for the opposite side of the well, putting the low structure between me and the monster even as it checked its headlong charge and turned to face me.
It circled the well as it approached, and I circled to keep it on the other side. It reached the well and, letting out a bellow of rage, it swung at the structure, tearing through the two solid wooden pillars that held the well’s roof in place.
We could see each other now, and I moved in closer so I could circle the well wall as fast as MT adversary. We danced around in circles for a while, first one way then the other. I had no idea what I could do to beat this thing, so concentrated on keeping out of its grasp. It wasn’t going to keep me alive for long though.
There was definitely something going on in that thing’s head, because it soon realised that it wasn’t going to catch me by chasing me round the ruined structure. Its first solution was to jump over the obstacle, which it did from a standing start. I was almost too surprised to react, but just managed to gather my skirts and run in close to what was left of the well while it was still airborne. We ended up on opposite sides again, the impasse continued.
Its second solution was a little more successful. It started to gather tiles from the destroyed well roof and throw them at me. Its aim wasn’t that good, but the projectiles were thrown with such force, it would only take one direct hit to floor me. I squealed and flinched as I dodged the makeshift missiles, then let out a wild scream as one of them struck me on the shoulder, tearing through my dress and leaving me with a deep gouge in my arm. It was the beginning of the end. I gripped the wound as tightly as I could to stem the flow of blood, but it would slow me down, weaken me. It was only a matter of time now.
Charlie later told me that it was the sound of my scream that brought him back to consciousness. I didn’t see him immediately as the mountain of scars and muscles started chasing me around the well again, pausing from time to time to throw more stones at me. It was as much a surprise to me as it was to the monster when Charlie appeared from behind it and swung an enormous length of two by four, striking it across the back.
The monster stumbled a couple of paces towards the well, then stopped and turned towards its assailant. I saw a desperate chance and took it before Charlie and I were both pulverised into dust. I ran around the well and threw myself onto my hands and knees behind its legs. Charlie saw my intention and advanced, stabbing at the misshapen face with the splintered end of his weapon.
Brick stepped backwards in surprise and tripped against me, falling further back, head first into the well. It was less than a second before we heard a mighty splash from the bottom. Would it be enough? I rolled over, leaning against what remained of the well wall and nursing my injuries. Charlie and I waited, breath bated. He’d gone in head first. The well would be shallow I hoped. There wasn’t a lot of room to squirm around in there. Surely there was a chance this was all over.
A roar of purest fury rose from the depths and giant arms began to beat against the sides of the well. Would it be able to climb out? Was there anything we could do to finish it off?
Charlie ran to the edge of the well and threw in his length of wood. I followed his lead, picking up the remains of the roof, or at least the bits my weakened, delicate arms could manage, and threw them down too. They did little more than enrage the creature even more. We stopped, looking around for better weapons. Nothing sprang to mind.
“The millstone!” Charlie yelled, and I followed his pointing finger.
Close to one of the courtyard walls was an old stone mill – the sort usually driven by a donkey. The top stone was separate and leaning against the wall. It looked small enough to fit down the well, but heavy enough to cause the damage we needed. We ran to it, Charlie reaching it first. His sword lay nearby, where the monster had thrown it, and he picked it up to use as a lever. Between us we rolled the stone across the courtyard, my contribution being more one of guidance than strength.
The cacophony of rage still poured out the mouth of the well. Given time, he would either bury himself in rocks as he tore the lining of the well apart, or he would punch handholds into the wall and climb out. Neither of us was prepared to wait and find out which and, with a final effort, we heaved the millstone forward with enough momentum to broach the already weakened wall and send it crashing down on the behemoth below.
It was too dark to see down, but the cessation of yelling and crashing was a good sign. We could hear groaning and laboured breaths from the depths, but they weakened and stopped after a few minutes.
It was over. The last of the monsters was dead and we had survived, but at what price? Charlie helped me to my feet and supported me as I almost collapsed from the pain in my ribs – Brick’s parting gift to me as he tripped over me. The last of my adrenaline reserves were depleted. The pain from all my injuries took over. The cut in my arm, still bleeding profusely, the bruised – maybe cracked – ribs, my burnt hand from the confrontation with Lucy, blisters now burst from struggling with the millstone.
“Come on, we’d better get you patched up,” Charlie said as he guided me back into the castle, sword still grasped in one hand. “I know where we can find the remains of an old party dress we can rip up for bandages.”
It was more relief than real laughter, but I started giggling, and might not have been able to stop if not for the pain in my ribs.
Charlie had his fair share of bangs and scrapes from being thrown into a building, so there wasn’t much left of the white dress by the time all wounds were cared for.
“So what now?” Charlie asked as I knotted a last bandage around his head. Blood was already soaking through the bindings making me wish for a proper hospital, but our hostess had insisted we remain until dawn and that was still some hours away. We’d have to make do as best we could.
“I’d like to see if your clothes are dry yet. I’ve had enough of this bloody dress.”
“Can I watch?”
That brought a smile to the surface. “I’d say you’ve earned that much, but I’d have thought seeing a girl in the mirror every morning would make that a bit of an anti-climax.”
“I never had a body that does what this one does when it sees naked, female flesh. I’d like to explore the feeling further.”
“OK, you can look but don’t touch. I wouldn’t want you to think I was easy.”
We made our way up to our rooms, where Charlie’s jeans and sweatshirt were just about dry enough to wear. I made something of a show of changing which, from the bulge in Charlie’s trousers, went down well.
“We could get some rest,” I suggested when all was done and I was relaxing into the joys of not wearing skirts.
“If you remember, you destroyed the quilt on my bed.”
“So I did. Still this bed looks big enough for the two of us.”
“You go ahead. By my count we still have at least one monster left to deal with.”
“That’s hardly a polite way to speak of your hostess.” We spun to find Doctor Francescanstein leaning against the doorway. Charlie must have been expecting her to turn up, because he responded rapidly. I’d been wondering why he’d insisted on keeping his sword with him, now I knew as he sent it flying, end over end, towards his quarry.
The blade buried itself halfway to its hilt, but for all that it had no effect on the pale figure. She smiled at Charlie, grasped the blade and pulled it out, letting it fall to the ground with a clang. A bloodless wound knit together leaving unblemished skin behind.
“And that’s just downright rude. Lucky for you I don’t bear grudges.”
“What do you want?” Charlie was quivering with a rage I shared. After what she’d put us through, she had the audacity to stand there making cheap jokes.
“Oh, just to remind you that we need to convene in the dining hall before sunrise. I must say, you two have provided most excellent sport and you deserve a little bit of a rest before we bring this evening’s entertainment to a close. I’ll send Riffraff to collect you when it’s time.”
“Sport!” Charlie spat out the word. “Six people dead and you call it sport? Just what kind of sick creature are you?”
“One that still possesses considerably more power than you can fight.” Her words turned suddenly sharp, as though her patience and cheerful manner were no more than a thin veneer over a twisted mess of less wholesome feelings. “Come to the dining hall in time for sunrise and we shall conclude our business.”
She spun on taloned heels and stalked off.
“Come on Charlie,” I tugged at his arm, pulling him towards the bed. “There’s not much you can do either to attack or defend against her, and nothing we do now will make a blind bit of difference to the others. I suggest we try and get a little sleep, and maybe bleed a bit on her sheets.”
He let himself be led, but with reluctance. Underneath the surviving quilt in what had been his room, I snuggled into the crook of his arm and settled onto his chest. Sleep eluded us both, for which I was at least a little grateful, vaguely remembering the problems with unconsciousness and concussion, and not wanting to lose Charlie too. Instead we lay in silence and watched the embers fade in the fireplace.
A gentle tap on the door was followed by Riffraff’s inane leer peeking through a gap in the doorway.
“The doctor requests your presence in the dining hall. Daybreak is in less than half an hour so it is essential you come at once.”
Our combined mood was subdued and belligerent, but not openly rebellious. We had gone to bed with shoes on, so we were ready almost immediately. I caught a glimpse of myself in a mirror. My hair need some attention, but with no hairbrush and no time to spare, it would have to do.
Riffraff led us downstairs, opened the dining room door and ushered us in. The table and some of the chairs were a little worse for wear, having succumbed to the Mummy’s touch. Deep scars of rotting wood marked where her hands had brushed against the wood, but apart from being unsightly, both chairs and table remained functional.
Seated in their original places, the remains of our six companions were already at table. Brick’s squashed and blood body sat next to a pile of grey dust. Pete was sprawled in another chair, blood and gore dripping from the gaping exit wound in the back of his head. Beside him, dust motes danced, forming the faintest of outlines which only imagination and force of will could convince you took on the shape of a human being. Finally, Damien and Amy sat side by side, the silver headed upper half of Charlie’s cane still protruding from Damien’s chest, and Amy cradling her head in her lap.
Charlie was all for storming out of the room with me in close pursuit, when the voice of our hostess drifted across the room with a calm insistence.
“Come in. Thank you for being prompt. Please take you seats so that we can bring matters to a close. I would offer you breakfast, but I doubt you’re in the mood.”
Reluctantly – almost involuntarily – we stepped into the room. Charlie held my chair as he had done before, and we sat amongst our victims, feeling quite sick at heart.
“All Saints’ Day is almost upon us,” our cloaked hostess said, “and the few short hours allotted to us the night before for our dance macabre are almost at an end. I promised you a night of terror and self-discovery, and indeed that is what you have received.
“For six of you, what greater terror than to face your own death; what greater self-discovery than to embrace the monsters that lurk inside of you? I have power over this night, and the horrors that centuries of superstition and sick imaginings have brought to it. What better use for it than to draw from your sordid depths, the evil and ugliness that you nurture there.
“For you two,” she turned to face Charlie and me, “to face such danger, to fight your own fears, to see past the monsters you have confronted to the humanity beneath. Courage and compassion, guilt and regret over the deaths of even such unworthy souls as these. Many people possess the potential for such things, but few realise it as readily as you. You have faced your fears and mastered them, yet not allowed those fears to be replaced by hate, and you have my respect and admiration for your fortitude, as well as my gratitude for a night of such entertainment as I have not enjoyed in many long years.
“For that, I shall give you one final choice. On this special day, dawn’s first rays, properly directed, have the power to restore things to the way they were, to undo all the changes I have done. Your dinner companions can have their lives back if you wish, but the restoration must be absolute. What brings them back to their former selves must be directed onto you as well. You must choose swiftly though, daybreak is only minutes away.”
There was no choice. Charlie and I looked at each other sharing a profound regret, but knowing we couldn’t trade six lives, even of selfish losers like those sat around us, for the changes we had undergone. A thought nagged at the back of my mind; a memory caught my attention.
“I thought you said only two of us would leave here as ourselves.”
“I did say that, and the beginning of the evening did see you all transformed into truer representations of yourselves. There are winners and losers in any endeavour, and your survival tonight entitles you to keep the changes, to live out the rest of your lives as you are right now, but only at a cost to these others here.
“Charlie’s attack on me earlier, and much of what I have felt and heard from you throughout the night, indicate that you are not prepared to accept your prize at such a cost, so I give you the choice. Surrender the prize and your companions will live, restored to the way they were, just as you will be.”
There was malice in her words. This was her revenge on us for having the temerity to attack her. She knew how hard it would be for either of us to give up what we had only just started to accept and enjoy. Guilt or regret, neither would be easy to live with. I nodded to Charlie, feeling a deep sorrow at what we were about to give up. He nodded back, the same sorrow mirrored in his eyes.
“Then let us all be restored.”
An expression of vicious delight grew on our hostess’s face as she indicated for Riffraff to wind the handle again. The chandeliers lowered over our heads once more, only this time instead of spikes, silver mirrors emerged, angling towards the open window.
High clouds already banded the sky, streaked with tangerine and turquoise. One part of the horizon glowed brighter than the rest, then the brilliance of the sun’s first rays lanced through the window and deflected off each mirror to illuminate the eight seats around the table.
There was a warmth and a gentle tingling, and I felt my body swell and grow. For a moment I worried that I would tear my way out of Charlie’s clothes, but then hadn’t the dress changed to fit when I had transformed earlier? Hadn’t Charlie’s suit done the same?
Deep regret settled on me as I felt my breasts shrink back into me, my hair shorten, my shoulders broaden. A gasp next to me and a clatter of wood and metal indicated that Damien was back. I turned to look at his bewildered expression in time to see Amy’s head rise, spinning, from her lap and settle back on her neck, the flesh and sinew knitting together as though it had never been cut. All around the table changes were happening. Dust motes swirled ever more quickly, ever more thickly, until they coalesced into Drusilla’s Gothic features, Pete’s head filled out front and back until he was whole, Grey dust rose in a spinning maelstrom, rebuilding itself into Lucy’s familiar form, and Brick’s broken body inflated like a blow up doll until he sat there, larger than life as usual.
The costumes were gone. Everyone was dressed as they must have arrived, with even Charlie and me switching clothes, just as we switched bodies. Nobody spoke, but the looks we all exchanged bore evidence of the experiences we had shared. There was something akin to respect and gratitude in the eyes each of the others turned our way.
As the reflected first light faded, we turned towards the head of the table, but there was no-one there. Even Riffraff was gone from his place by the handle. We stood, looking around us for some sign of them, but all that remain was a deep, throaty chuckle, fading into the space between hearing and imagination.
All around us, the castle began to fade. Stone, furniture, everything, and before long we were standing at the top of a hill that had always been bare. Three cars were parked nearby, and a fourth a little way off, swerved off the road looking for all the world as though it had been hit by a meteorite.
“Sorry about that,” Brick said, following our gaze. “My dad runs a garage. I’ll get him to come up and tow it later. If we can’t fix it, we’ll replace it, OK?”
Brick had never been this nice before, but there was an almost pleading look in his eyes, as if he needed some way to express his gratitude. I nodded my head.
“Sure. Thanks.”
“You can ride back to town with us.” Amy the bitch queen speaking, but her expression was genuinely friendly, as was Damien’s. Pete and Drew stood behind them ready to offer their own transport should we decline the first offer.
I looked at Charlie who shook her head imperceptibly.
“Thanks guys, but if it’s all the same with you, we’re going to hang out up here for a while.”
“We’ll look for you when we come up with the tow truck,” Brick said. “If you’re still here, you can ride back down with us.”
Again I nodded my thanks and we watched as the three couples climbed into their cars and drove off, slowly, subdued and thoughtful.
Charlie shivered in the cold November morning air, so I put my arm around her shoulders and led her towards the shelter of a rocky outcrop, where we sat to watch the sun climb higher into the sky.
“We did make the right decision, didn’t we Brand… on?”
The way she corrected herself over my name added to the weight dragging on my heart. I had loved being Brandy and felt the loss keenly, even after having been her for only a few short hours.
“Absolutely.” I believed it, but couldn’t quite make myself sound convincing.
“Then why do I feel so bad?”
“It’s the nature of sacrifice, love. If it were easy, it wouldn’t be worth much.”
“I just wish…”
The thought didn’t need completing. I turned her face towards mine. She really was beautiful, more so even than I had been as Brandy. There was a deep ache in my chest, but not from the love I felt for her, more from the regret that neither of us could be who we felt we were inside. If only there were a little more magic to the day.
I leaned forward and kissed her – him. In my mind, I was the girl, and this delicate creature in my arms was the strong, dependable rock in my life. I lost myself in my imagination and desire, barely feeling the warm tingling that spread through me.
The kiss lasted a long while, and at the end, everything was different. I opened my eyes and looked up into a face I had seen in the mirror every morning of my life, brow creasing even as realisation dawned.
“Brandon?” my own voice asked me. Familiar, yet so very different for hearing it from the outside.
My heart skipped inside me, the heaviness lifting away so fast it hurt. “Actually,” Charlie’s sweet tones emerged from my throat, quivering with sudden emotion, “I think that’s going to have to be you from now on. But yes, yes it’s me.”
I threw my arms around his – formerly my – neck and pushed him to the ground. Straddling him, I leaning in with eager lips. Strong arms enfolded me, squashing my breasts into his firm chest.
“This so weird,” he said, once we were done exploring each other’s dentistry.
“I know, but in such a good way. I’ve always wanted to be you – physically I mean – and right now,” I stroked a firm pectoral, “I have never been happier that I took care of my body.”
“You and me both,” he looked down at the bulges under my sweatshirt, some small disappointment showing that they were not better displayed. “But isn’t this a bit narcissistic; like falling in love with yourself?”
“I fell in love with the person inside this hunk of meat,” I slapped him playfully on the chest, “even when you were inside this one.” I was gentler with myself. “It’s not what’s on the outside that counts, it’s who’s on the inside.
“Not that I object to the outside. Narcissistic it may be, but I’ve always thought I had pretty good looking bod. Now that I’m getting to enjoy it from a different perspective, I have to say there’s a lot to appreciate.”
He didn’t need to respond; his eyes shone like a mirror to my own feelings.
“What do you think happened?” he asked. “I mean it couldn’t have been that creepshow creature from last night. She was only too happy to see us suffer.”
“I don’t know, and I doubt we’ll ever know for sure. I’d like to think it’s the dawn light of this special day. I mean it had the power to put things right in the castle, to undo the horrors she brought into our world. Maybe someone somewhere thought that there was a little more putting right to be done.
“You know, she had us every which way. If we’d tried to make it as Brandy and Charlie from last night, if we’d chosen to keep the bodies she gave us, we’d never have been able to convince anyone of who we were. We would most likely have ended up being accused of six murders, possibly eight if you included our disappearance. This way is so much better. We just get to swap lives, and if you’ve wanted to be me as much as I have always wanted to be you, I think it’ll be an equitable trade.”
Charlie – no, Brandon – nodded. “Do you think it’s going to be permanent?”
“Again I have no way of knowing. I’m going to hope so though, and live my life as though it is.”
We settled back to enjoy the bright sunshine, unusual for this time of year, and to swap stories about the families we were to inherit from each other. As the morning grew old, the day turned uncommonly warm for November, but not quite warm enough to be comfortable, so we were both glad when Brick and his dad turned up.
We heard them first, chatting companionably as they attached cables and winched the remains of my – now Charlie’s, no, Brandon’s darn it! – car onto the back of the tow truck. I snaked an arm around his waist as we ambled towards them, his hand spent a moment on my shoulder, then drifted down to settle on my bum, slipping into the back pocket of my jeans. It felt good, so I let him leave it there.
“Charlie?” A shiver of delight passed through me at being called by my new name. I squeezed his waist in response. “Next year for Halloween, what say we just stay in and watch TV or something?”
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NumbersRunner
political commentary on decision-making and ethics in San Diego government
Five easy questions
Question #1: Ever wonder what an auditor does?
I was introduced to the term auditor at an early age. “If anyone asks you what your father does for a living,” my mother instructed, “just say he’s an auditor.” Many years would pass before I figured out that auditor was more than a code word for daddies who ran numbers and booked bets.
Auditors could also be professionals in public and private institutions who assessed financial documents and business transactions for accuracy and legal compliance. Numbers runners, yes, but respectable.
A decade ago, Eduardo Luna was hired as San Diego’s City Auditor. He had the training, experience, and commitment to public service to withstand political pressure while running the office of City Auditor “to advance open and accountable government through accurate, independent, and objective audits and investigations that seek to improve the economy, efficiency, and effectiveness of San Diego City government.”
Eduardo Luna’s prescribed ten-year term in office recently expired. But before he moved on I got a first hand look at how an independent, ethical public auditor pursues the job of exposing fraud, waste, and malfeasance within city government.
This summer, a new City Auditor will be appointed. Under City Charter provisions the mayor selects the City Auditor for a ten-year term, subject to City Council approval.
Question #2: Who remembers the Kroll Report?
Once upon a time our city was in such deep financial and ethical trouble we were branded Enron-by-the-Sea.
Back then, former mayor Susan Golding--deftly assisted by former city manager Jack McGrory and Golding’s chief of staff Kris Michell (currently recycled as San Diego's chief operating officer under mayor Kevin Faulconer)--had managed to suck the city coffers dry while hosting the 1996 Republican National Convention.
With loyal help from then-city auditor Ed Ryan, officials engaged in cooking the books and padding the budget through disastrous agreements with municipal union leaders to underfund the city’s pension system while simultaneously amping up pension benefits. With nary a peep from the city auditor, San Diego's future was put up as collateral.
The enormity of ongoing financial mismanagement and falsified financial statements and disclosures eventually hit the fan. By 2004 investigations were initiated by the Securities and Exchange Commission, US Attorney’s Office, and San Diego District Attorney.
Finally, the City Council got on the ball and retained Kroll, Inc., a governmental risk management firm, to conduct an independent investigation.
The resultant 400-page, $20 million Kroll Report excoriated San Diego politicians and upper management for financial dishonesty, securities fraud, gross lack of accountability, egregious cover-ups, non-transparency, obfuscation, and denial of fiscal reality.
According to the San Diego Business Journal: "dozens of local officials and municipal employees put their own welfare ahead of the taxpayer for close to a decade, then tried to keep the lid on their wrongdoing…the evidence demonstrates not mere negligence, but deliberate disregard for the law, disregard for fiduciary responsibility and disregard for the financial welfare of the city's residents over an extended period of time…"
The newspaper editorial ruefully added that "we here in America's Finest City just shrug our shoulders and mumble that it's business as usual." Of course, it takes coordinated teamwork to maintain business as usual.
Question #3: Anyone here look familiar?
The Kroll Report called out many city officials for being “negligent in the fulfillment of their duties” and for “recklessly or intentionally allowing the city to issue false reports regarding its true fiscal health,” including:
Previous councilmember Ralph Inzunza (now writing his 2nd semi-autobiographical novel)
Previous councilmember George Stevens (died in 2006)
Previous councilmember Byron Wear (now a land use/transportation consultant)
Then-sitting mayor Dick Murphy (now retired. “You can delegate authority, but you can’t delegate responsibility,” he once declared)
Previous councilmember Scott Peters (now US Congressman)
Previous councilmember Toni Atkins (now California State Senator)
Previous councilmember Jim Madaffer (now public policy consultant and SD County Water Authority Board chairman)
Previous councilmember Brian Maienschein (now California State Assemblyman and latest SD convert from Republican to Democrat)
Past city manager Mike Uberuaga (now ??)
Past city manager Jack McGrory (now CEO real estate/investment LLC and California State University Board of Trustees)
Past city attorney Casey Gwinn (now CEO San Diego County YWCA, President National Family Justice Center Alliance)
Previous city auditor/controller Ed Ryan (now??)
And previous councilmember Donna Frye—but note that she was the sole official in the entire bunch to have publicly protested and decried city malfeasance (now president emerita of CalAware)
Also named were a former deputy city manager, city treasurer, assistant auditor, retirement administrator, utilities finance administrator, wastewater deputy director, deputy city attorney, and assistant city attorney
Question #4: Things have changed since the bad old days, haven’t they?
In 2007 the city was halfway through a 5-year trial period of our switch to a “strong-mayor” form of government, a magic potion sold to San Diego voters guaranteeing political transparency, crystal-clear government accountability, and knowing precisely where the buck stops in city government.
With mayor Jerry Sanders occupying the catbird seat a Charter Review Committee was convened to tie up loose ends about substantive issues, like:
...when was the right time to add a 9th city council district?
...how many council votes should be required to override the mayor’s veto?
...was it a good idea for the city’s chief operating officer to be a mayoral (i.e., political) appointee?
...should the city auditor be elected by the voters (to maximize workplace independence) rather than appointed by the mayor (the person in charge of the departments the city auditor would investigate)?
The committee resolved these questions, but not necessarily wisely:
...Our city council now hosts a 9-member array of colorful personalities and political persuasion.
...Despite a Democratic super-majority, council overrides of mayoral vetoes remain rare.
...The city's COO, appointed and answerable to the mayor, is currently a well-oiled, longtime political insider.
...As for the city auditor—despite the pretense of an expensive national search for the most talented candidate to fill the vacancy, the mayor selected a team-playing San Diego insider, well-versed in the don’t-upset-the-applecart rules of the old guard game.
In other words, our first and only independent city auditor steps out the door, only to be replaced by a throwback to the bad old days of yesteryear.
Question #5: Now what?
Kevin Falconer will be out of office soon enough. But it's a grave mistake to assume that the private interests controlling this mayor will walk away when he's gone. Mayoral candidate Todd Gloria is already in the bag. Candidate Barbara Bry has yet to soar on her fledgling independent wings.
One thing's for sure: installing a proxy city auditor means controlling the city’s system of checks and balances for the next ten years.
This isn't a political party issue. This isn't a conservative versus progressive standoff. It’s a question of protecting the public purse and creating and maintaining honesty and integrity in city government.
On Wednesday of this week, the city’s audit committee will meet and review Faulconer’s choice for city auditor. Eventually, the city council will vote to confirm (or not) the mayor's hand-picked choice. We’ll soon find out where our elected councilmembers stand on issues of good government, public integrity, and city reform.
Posted by ndamashek@ucsd.edu at 1:05 PM
Duck-duck-goose: San Diego's quest for a new mayor
Let’s start with an urban tale about dreams and possibilities. Not long ago in a city far, far away, an international gathering took place and it called itself the Fearless Cities Summit.
And this summit brought together 700 mayors and councilmembers and active citizen groups from far-flung cities and towns around the world. And their plan was to collaborate on creating global networks of solidarity in the cause of human rights, democracy, and the common good. Overblown hype?
As it turns out, the “fearless cities” concept is completely down to earth. It entails people merging their efforts to modify local government institutions and create practical programs that address the specific needs of their particular communities. Their efforts are unified by a simple overarching goal--to improve the lives of city residents. Who could find fault with that?
The first “fearless cities” summit took place two years ago in Barcelona—a city that had, for decades, encouraged and enjoyed a tourism and real-estate boom. But something insidious began revealing itself. A gradual distortion of the city’s priorities forced out local businesses, drove up rents, accelerated gentrification, and muscled out city residents. Under the rallying cry of “Barcelona is not for sale," the city boldly embarked on a candid reassessment of the soundness of their growth model based on tourism.
The second fearless cities summit was held in New York City, the third in Warsaw. Next up will be Brussels, where the city will present a progress report on local initiatives it created to deal with its troubled financial, housing, mobility, jobs, infrastructure, and environmental sectors.
Sounds like a familiar set of urban troubles, doesn't it?
No, I’m not suggesting that San Diego has the desire—let alone the oomph--to join the ranks of fearless cities. We’re far from ready to reassess our status as a tourism mecca, much less pull down our city’s “for sale” sign.
Okay, let's admit it: San Diego is actually a fearful city, where elected officials obediently go along to get along with a well-endowed tourism industry and intimidating real estate/building/growth machine power brokers. Even our citizen groups are easily silenced by a few token crumbs.
Given the usual consequences, maybe we should just cry uncle! But no, there’s another alternative. It’s called compromise.
Her's what I suggest: why don't we settle for improving the biggest small issue that plagues San Diego and causes us much grief? How about settling for the modest goal of becoming a very well-managed city?
That’s it? A. Very. Well. Managed. City? Think about it this way:
when no city official is held accountable for delivering the goods to city residents…
if no one takes responsibility for slipshod oversight of city workers or the work of private contractors…
when no one keeps tabs on how the San Diego Housing Commission spends public money…
if no one remembers that problem-oriented community policing, once a diamond in San Diego’s ear, was stealthily abandoned…
when no one answers for continual botched attempts to ameliorate the city’s homeless crisis, not even to provide adequate public toilets…
if no one noticed that the chief of the city water department didn’t supervise his meter readers, who were overcharging water customers (that’s us) by over $2 million…
when no one answers the phone in the office of code compliance/enforcement, while city regulations are violated right and left…
if no one can explain why the city throws good money after bad on real-estate deals that sit empty for years…
when no one turns up for over a year to change a street light bulb…
if no one seems to be minding the store…
when no one knows where the buck stops…
The obvious conclusion? San Diego is A. Very. Poorly. Managed. City. Is it due to the woeful performance of this mayor? Or to our bungled transition to a strong mayor system from a city manager government (far from perfect but, in hindsight, more accountable to the public)? Or to our falsified, papered-over pension/budget fiasco? Or? Whatever reason, the outcome is--or ought to be--grounds for rebellion.
Now think about it this way: if the fundamental goal of fearless cities is simply to improve the lives of city residents, couldn’t even a fearful city like ours make real and immediate progress toward improving the lives of city residents by setting minimal but firm requirements for our mayor and other elected officials to deliver a well-managed city to San Diego residents?
Which brings us to Tasha Williamson, a candidate in San Diego’s 2020 race for mayor. The San Diego City Clerk currently lists the circle of 9 candidates running for mayor. (I've already written commentaries on Todd Gloria, Barbara Bry, and Cory Briggs--who says he's a candidate but has yet to file the requisite paperwork with the city clerk.)
Did you ever hear of the game called duck-duck-goose? It’s where 'it' goes around a circle of players and taps each on the head, saying 'duck… duck… duck.' Then 'it' taps an unsuspecting player on the head and calls out 'goose.' So 'goose' has to run in circles to tag 'it' before 'it' plops down in the vacated spot left by 'goose.' That's sort of the way San Diego's political races play out.
Tasha Williamson (TW) is on the list of players eyeing the soon-to-be-vacated spot of San Diego mayor. One thing's for sure: in this political game she’s no duck. Not a goose, either. Could it be she’s more of a swan? Is it possible for a swan with a resonant message to steal the show--at least for a while?
Keep this in mind: swans are not outsiders. They swim the entire pond and know the territory as well as any duck or goose. And you better take heed of them. They know how to hiss. They know how to bite.
What sets TW apart from other candidates is her fearless call for changes that benefit our city’s traditionally underserved sectors.
Almost a decade ago, TW co-founded the San Diego Compassion Project, serving members and families victimized by gang-related and other violent acts. Her community actions prompted the Union-Tribune to place her name on their list of Voices of the Year. She knows the city well enough to give credible voice to many subjects that are usually swept under the rug, like:
→ racial profiling and police offenses in our city...
→ the role city government should and could play in enhancing public schools in all neighborhoods...
→ concrete, humane responses to the needs of the city’s homeless, poor, addicted, and mentally ill populations...
→ resetting misdirected, unfairly apportioned, and wasteful budget priorities...
→ beneficial public reuse of public property in the city we all call home...
Tasha Williamson is in the right place at the right time to bring a fearless voice to the mayoral debate. San Diego voters (and other candidates, as well) can learn a lot from TW's perspectives, perceptions, and experience. It's a fact--the burden of management failures in our city falls most heavily on our chronically shortchanged communities. And inevitably, every resident in a badly-managed city suffers the consequences.
Yes, a mayor's priorities and goals matter. But expert management is indispensable if we ever want to see good intentions actually materialize. The necessity of upgrading the mechanics of city government is part and parcel of what it will take to implement new priorities for raising the quality of life in every community and for all residents. Now is the perfect time to tackle this unglamorous but burdensome city albatross.
Of course, exposing and airing the issues are not the same as being able to deliver the goods. The quest for the best leader for a fearless future for San Diego continues. Pass the word along: the cut-off date for mayoral candidates to get their names on the primary ballot is not until December 5, 2019.
Posted by ndamashek@ucsd.edu at 11:17 AM
Labels: Barbara Bry, city management, Cory Briggs, mayor's race, Tasha Williamson, Todd Gloria
San Diego’s mayor: past, present, and future (part 4)
Mayoral candidate Cory Briggs (CB)
Once upon a time in the city of San Diego a much-heralded and wondrous happening took place.
From a crowded field of mayoral candidates (including three sturdy Republicans--Nathan Fletcher, Bonnie Dumanis, Carl DeMaio), voters chose to elect a brash, iconoclastic, independent, politically progressive Democrat to become the city’s mayor.
That person was Bob Filner. It was the first and only time in recorded history that an authentic liberal came to power in San Diego.
Personally, he was a flawed agent. Politically, his record was clean. But before the public had a chance to see what our city could become with progressive-minded people in charge, he was run out of town.
Today there’s another brash, iconoclastic, (seemingly) independent, (sort of) politically progressive candidate running for mayor of San Diego. His name is Cory Briggs. Over the past couple of decades, attorney Briggs has been laboring at loosening the stranglehold of San Diego’s old-boys-club over city politics.
In an ironic twist to this tempestuous tale, the former-mayor Filner was in the process of confronting the same entrenched powerbrokers before he was ejected from office.
In another ironic twist, CB and TG--the two politically liberal male candidates now running for mayor--were pivotal participants (alongside fellow-travelers who lurked behind a lineup of outraged women and powerful business interests) in the friendly fire that brought down the aforementioned ex-mayor, who lacked a civilian army capable of advancing his cause or of defending him from the onslaught. Depending on what is really motivating CB to run for mayor, he, too, may be vulnerable to similar deadly assaults.
It’s a hot potato. Before we drop it, there are a few related questions that still need honest answers from the candidate:
Filner's personal proclivities were not an area of concern for CB. So what triggered CB's lethal attack?
Was CB (like Todd Gloria) suffering the agonies of thwarted personal ambition, having been spurned by the new mayor?
Or might it be that CB was simply doing friends a political favor by getting rid of this mayor in order to speed up Nathan Fletcher’s second attempt to take over the vacated mayor's seat?
Whatever the motivation, was CB’s choice to overthrow the mayor a rational decision?
When he and his partners held a press conference to call for the mayor's resignation, did anyone have a backup plan? Or did CB spontaneously mount the diving board, hold his nose, and jump... to hell with the consequences?
In other words, what can we deduce about the political judgment of a mayoral candidate who helped precipitate Plan A (a palace coup) without a Plan B (after storming the Bastille, what comes next)? After all, coups have consequences.
Keep this in mind: in the aftermath of the political crusade to bring down a duly-elected mayor, the city suffered six years of failed leadership, deteriorating public services across the city, and a score of needless deaths on the streets.
Does CB, in some way, share responsibility with other actors in this riotous plotline for what would come after they achieved their short-term political goal?
And yet… Cory Briggs may be the perfect candidate for the 2020 race for mayor in San Diego. He's one of an exceedingly small group of San Diegans with a reputation as an advocate for the public good. He’s got a tight combination of guts, smarts, ability, and stamina that props him up in the face of the political and financial power brokers who have traditionally shaped San Diego’s politics and policies.
As a leading candidate in the mayor’s race, his presence will open the debate to a full range of city issues and force other mayoral candidates to confront controversial subjects they might otherwise try to avoid.
In this moment in time, and for these reasons, CB qualifies as this season’s “it man.”
Of course, being a perfect candidate does not automatically lead to being a good mayor. CB has a proliferation of warts. Are they harder to tolerate than those of his blemished opponent Todd Gloria? Or Barbara Bry? What do they tell us about the odds of CB becoming a good mayor?
Here’s a sampling of what we're looking at:
CB has zero experience in elected political office, He claims that his legal battles with the city have educated him about running the city: “You have to know how the gears work to know where to put the monkey wrench.” But being a good mayor calls for leadership and professional management skills (fatally lacking in our current mayor and his appointees). CB’s lack of a political record means we have nothing to go on in those crucial areas…
CB says he will shatter the establishment and shake up the status quo. Yes, he has achieved some success through skillful lawsuits against the city. But the litigation process focuses on winning. It deals in short term goals and strategies. Running a city involves long-term, multifaceted thinking and planning. Ideally, it involves respect for the public good. Does CB have what it takes to switch from blocking bad projects to creating proposals that serve the long-range broad public interest?...
CB has many admirers within the environmental and planning communities. He also has unforgiving detractors who accuse him of turning his back on them in client negotiations and settlements. Their gripes often spin around the notion of trust. Lack of trust in a lawyer or mayor poisons the waters…
CB has undergone in-depth investigation (some call a public reaming) in the past few years by Voice of San Diego, public radio station KPBS, and its collaborative arm inewsource. Their reporters wrote exhaustively about CB's business practices, ethics, and use of self-created nonprofit organizations as plaintiffs when launching lawsuits. CB’s wife did not escape allegations from the same investigative outlets. A vendetta by San Diego’s tourism industry, a prime target of Briggs’ lawsuits? Noxious fumes from the office of former-City Attorney Jan Goldsmith? These past investigations have an upside: CB comes to the mayor’s race with few, if any, unexamined ghosts cowering in his closet…
CB takes a contrarian position on the current rage known as build-baby-build. He calls out the mayor, along with other pro-density housing advocates, for misleading the public with claims that higher density housing projects will alleviate the city’s affordable (workforce) housing crisis. Is his approach an opportunistic wooing of neighborhood and community groups (aka “nimbys”) or has he widened his focus from litigating civic misdeeds to creating broader neighborhood-centered policies?...
CB calls out the mayor for misleading the public about the severity of the city’s crumbling infrastructure and unconscionable missteps in alleviating our homelessness crisis. CB is inexperienced in overseeing city administration issues like these. And could he come up to speed on the city's pension debacle (yes, it's baaaaack) that once again might raise the specter of municipal bankruptcy?...
CB wields his brand as crusader for public accountability and open government, and as advocate for the voter class over the donor class. He publicly challenges most of San Diego’s powerful business mainstays: the Chamber of Corruption (that’s his spelling), Downtown Partnership, Civic San Diego, Taxpayers Association, Tourism Authority, Hotel-Motel Association, BIA, and prominent public relations/ lobbying groups. A good mayor needs the judgment to know the difference between working with these special interests and working for them.
But there have been troubling signs…
CB hopped into bed three years ago with a consortium of land development honchos: master manipulator Steve Peace, JMI Realty’s John Moores, SD Chargers special council Mark Fabiani, land developer Fred Maas, and Chargers honcho Dean Spano, authors of a ballot initiative called “The Citizens’ Plan for the Responsible Management of Major Tourism and Entertainment Resources.” (This initiative would have given the go-ahead to public financing of a new football stadium, imposed privately-managed “improvement districts” throughout the city, and expedited open-ended SDSU redevelopment in Mission Valley--all without public environmental review or control! Hardly the hallmark of transparency and public interest advocacy.)
CB added his name to this deceptive “citizens’ plan.” When he joined the team did he forget there is no vaccine against fleas? His participation cast doubts about the depth of his judgment and commitment to the public interest. Fortunately, voters exercised wiser judgment and rejected the initiative…
CB will be a valuable catalyst in the mayor’s race, that's for sure. Beyond that, the prognosis is murky. CB stares down the same black hole that once engulfed ex-Mayor Filner: the absence of essential supportive scaffolding. Yes, a successful mayor requires strong executive skills. But it's even more crucial to be surrounded by a skilled team of expert advisors with training and commitment to run a city efficiently and humanely. Without that, the city inevitably suffers.
There you have it: mayoral candidates Todd Gloria, Barbara Bry, and Cory Briggs--warts and all. As I said in the beginning of this 4-part series: it's up to them to put their best feet forward and publicize their particular strengths, records, accomplishments, and goals. My contribution is to round out the picture by providing an unadorned sketch of what may lay ahead.
But we're not quite done. Tasha Williamson has also declared her candidacy in San Diego’s 2020 race for mayor. She's a welcome addition, someone to enrich and expand the debate by bringing new perspectives to city issues. I’ll be writing about her shortly.
So far, no Republican candidates have revealed themselves. If and when that happens, you’ll read about them here.
Parting question: ...is that all there is? The pool of choices in San Diego’s 2020 mayor’s race is still woefully shallow. Despite plentiful rainfall this winter season, San Diego remains a sparsely-endowed political desert.
Surely there are a few good men... and women... sufficiently qualified to jump into the race. Why settle for good enough? How about electing a NOTEWORTHY mayor? Wouldn't that be a revolution in America's finest city!
Labels: Barbara Bry, Bob Filner, Cory Briggs, San Diego mayor, Tasha Williamson, Todd Gloria
Mayoral candidate Barbara Bry (BB)
Here's a fact: San Diego is a big small town in which--at one time or another--most everyone gets into bed with most everyone else (figuratively speaking, of course, but literally sometimes).
So when we question who’s got easy access to whom, we’re not just being nosy. The in-and-outs of political bonding can tell us a lot about how political deals and decisions are made, or which way a vote will go.
That's why it's important to keep an eye on endorsements, business partners, personal associations, and so on. Didn't you learn this as a kid? birds of a feather… peas in a pod… lie down with dogs….
In a less complacent city than ours, alarm bells would be ringing over conflict-of-interest pairings that, here in San Diego, don't even raise an eyebrow.
For example, there’s the domestic financial symbiosis between State Senator Toni Atkins, housing advocate and promoter of “smart growth” high-density development and spouse Jennifer LeSar, favored recipient of much-sought-after committee appointments and nonprofit housing contracts. Clients of LeSar Development Consultants in our region include the SD Housing Commission, El Cajon Housing Authority, Monarch Group, and Affirmed Housing Group.
Then there’s the politically adventuresome dynamic duo of State Assemblymember Lorena Gonzalez and her recent spouse County Supervisor Nathan Fletcher. Their double-fisted grip on the local Democratic Party facilitates who gets--or gets locked out of--crucial party funding and party endorsements. Sometimes even who gets targeted for the trash bin.
Headed for the trash bin, according to this week's headlines, is school board member Kevin Beiser. He’s running for City Council against fellow-Democrat Wendy Wheatcroft, the founder of a nonprofit coalition called San Diegans for Gun Violence Prevention who once exposed the fact that the National Rifle Association gave a high rating to Nathan Fletcher.
Shortly after it was created, her Gun Violence Prevention nonprofit did a somersault and endorsed Nathan Fletcher for County Supervisor (are 501c-4 nonprofits free to publicly endorse candidates? I think not).
Wendy Wheatcroft--whose campaign treasurer previously worked on Fletcher’s mayoral campaign--has recently been gifted with an official endorsement by Gonzalez-Fletcher. It's a wide bed, after all. [It's been suggested to me that a Gonzalez-Fletcher endorsement has not officially occurred. If I was mistaken, I regret the error.]
As for Kevin Beiser... looks like he’s toast. Maybe he deserves it. Maybe not. Maybe there are newsworthy others who will also be pulled down in this drama. Maybe not. Maybe one day we'll know the whole story. Probably not. But as we already observed: most everyone's a kissing cousin in our small big town.
Which brings us to the matter at hand--San Diego’s 2020 mayor’s race.
At first glance, Barbara Bry could pass for the girl next door. But look again—she’s no pushover.
Four decades ago BB was a business writer for the LA Times. Between then and now she has immersed herself in the magical universe of venture capital, business innovation, and entrepreneurship. It's a high-stakes, risk-filled, public-private cosmos, populated by angels with wads of cash in search of biotech, biomed, software, wireless, and telecommunications jackpots—keepers of the keys to the kingdom yet to come.
BB has a business degree from Harvard. She was founding editor and CEO of the online news outlet Voice of San Diego and, later, of the aborted San Diego News Network. Her company Blackbird Ventures invested in early stage technology companies. She created an organization called Run Women Run to inspire and train “pro-choice” women to enter political life.
Just two years ago she took her own advice and ran (successfully) to become San Diego councilmember in District 1. Her self-identification as a business woman working to empower other women is her lucky token. She's tossing it into the ring in the bigger race for mayor.
BB has a couple of campaign advantages over her opponent Todd Gloria in the mayor’s contest. First, her focus on business will bring a degree of support from Republican voters. And second, her political record is thin. While TG has to answer for a wart-filled record during eight years on the city council, BB's paper trail is scant. There’s not much to answer for.
Not to say that she’s blemish-free:
BB succumbed to the seductive lure of political sirens and, with barely half a council term under her belt, decided she was ready to take over the reins of city government and steer the future of San Diego...
BB falls back on hackneyed key words to define herself: fiscal discipline; tough decisions; stand up to special interests; fair treatment for all; comprehensive solutions; forward-looking leadership; uniter. Also: problem-solving skills; entrepreneurial mindset; consensus builder; pragmatist...
BB has a campaign slogan: “I mean business.” The question of voters is, whose business? The Let's-Run-Government-Like-a Business meme doesn't translate well for ordinary citizens in the real world. Private businesses frequently fail, dissolve, go bankrupt, or relocate overseas. Entrepreneurs say they embrace failure, but failure is a luxury city government cannot afford...
BB has a history of cohabitation in the world of big-scale real estate development. Her previous spouse was San Diego developer Pat Kruer--former California Coastal Commissioner and founding partner of Monarch Group, a private real estate entitlement, development, investment, and management firm. BB’s daughter is a partner at the Monarch Group…
BB renewed her connections to the world of real estate development via her current husband and business partner Neil Senturia--successful real estate developer of office buildings, condominiums, and hotels in Los Angeles and San Diego and loquacious founder and CEO of numerous diverse technology companies: “I have the sense that, at some level, the concept of profit has become a dirty word, I’m resentful”...
BB’s fundraising network ranges from the city’s hi-tech/ bio-tech universe to more grounded sources like real estate developer Jennifer LeSar, the Ace Parking family (one of the city’s prime-site land owners and likely beneficiary of the proposed paid parking lot in Balboa Park, should the Jacobs Park Makeover Plan ever come to fruition), and Convention Center expansion cheerleader Bob Nelson…
BB was an early proponent of the San Diego’s 2010 switch from a city manager form of government to the current (and in urgent need of revision) strong mayor system...
BB supported the dubious switch of the city's pension plan to a 401(k) plan. The Supreme Court has just thrown our costly pension mess back to the city to resolve. It's a hot potato that no city official wants to touch. The next mayor may have to...
BB’s chief of staff is Jamie Fox. She was previously deputy chief of staff for convicted-and-later-acquitted councilmember Ralph Inzunza...then director of communications for ex-councilmember Kevin Faulconer...then campaign manager and chief of staff for Todd Gloria throughout the roiling days of Bob Filner’s tenure in the mayor’s office. Now that her new boss BB is running against TG in the mayor’s race, is it unreasonable to speculate on latent conflicts of interest in her heart-of-hearts?…
BB’s chief policy staffer is Victoria Joes. She was policy advisor for Mayor Jerry Sanders and director of housing policy at the well-connected firm of Jennifer LeSar Development Consultants. It's a small world, after all...
BB calls herself a business-savvy decisionmaker. But cheerleading for SDSU’s open-ended expansion dreams for Mission Valley--a vision that entails a new stadium, thousands of housing units, office buildings, research facilities, magically created at no cost to taxpayers or students--is premature, at best...
BB lends her name to what looks like a bad business plan for the Mission Valley-SDSU (No city control over basic details. No bottom line about the price the city will accept for the sale of this coveted public land. No binding environmental agreements. No heads-up about traffic impacts. No assurances about creating the promised River Park. No timelines. No definition of “key deal points.” No financial guarantees). It enhances BB's claim as a risk taker but could undermine her standing as a protector of the public interest...
BB prided herself for having “confidence” to stand up to the mayor by opposing the “Soccer City” development proposal on the site of Qualcomm Stadium in Mission Valley and supporting the alternative SDSU West ballot initiative (which won voter approval). But neither proposal passed the smell test. Wouldn’t a good mayor have opposed both ballot choices and gotten to work on a comprehensive public planning process?...
BB’s support for the expansion of the downtown Convention Center falls into the same category. A good mayor would be wise to be skeptical about who the ultimate beneficiaries will be—the tourism industry? or the public footing the bill…
BB’s leadership role as a city councilmember is being squashed by the mayor and council cohorts. She joined fellow Democrats in calling for a national search for a new police chief and had to settle for a secret selection process and in-house appointee by the mayor. She took the lead on regulating short-term vacation rentals and was sabotaged. She stepped forward to regulate dockless scooters and was cast aside by the mayor and councilmember Mark Kersey. She gets scant support from the new contingent of “minority” women now on the city council…
BB went along with council decisions on granny flats, reduced parking requirements (she subsequently reversed her stand), and the mayor’s loosey-goosey proposal for a Community Choice Aggregation (energy) business plan. She shows she can be a team player. Can she develop the political clout to call more of the shots?…
Could it be that BB hasn’t yet gotten her political sea legs? Could it be that she hasn’t yet figured out San Diego's political universe? Could it be that her trusted advisors aren’t doing a good enough job looking out for her strategic and political interests?
The primary election for mayor is one year down the road. Is there time for Barbara Bry to grow? Spread her wings? Expand her scope? Be a risk taker by speaking truth to San Diego voters? Emerge as a multi-dimensional public-minded political leader?
Our final installment looks at mayoral candidate Cory Briggs.
Labels: Barbara Bry, City Council, Cory Briggs, San Diego mayor, Todd Gloria
San Diego’s mayor: present, past, and future (part 2)
Mayoral candidate Todd Gloria (TG)
Origin stories are the rage nowadays, but do they make one person intrinsically more worthy than another? Do they reliably predict the abilities, values, ethical yardstick, or qualifications a person develops over the years?
Take Todd Gloria, for example. You may already have a mental image of him as a likable, winsome, up-and-coming kind of guy. He self-identifies as a gay person of color: ½ Alaskan tribal- native American, 1/4 Filipino, a tad Dutch, and a touch Latino (Puerto Rican), nestled in a home-grown man from an economically disadvantaged background.
In other words, our man for all seasons.
TG was elected as heir apparent to the District 3 seat of the San Diego City Council following a particularly nasty primary battle against opponent Stephen Whitburn (who's running once again). The LGBTQ baton was passed to him by Toni Atkins, who had received it from Chris Kehoe.
At the end of their respective terms, Kehoe, Atkins, and then Gloria advanced to the CA State Assembly. Kehoe and Atkins eventually mounted the next rung to CA State Senate. Not TG. He's been hankering after Susan Davis's seat in the US Congress but she hasn't budged.
(Correction added) Starting in 2012, assemblymembers can serve a lifetime maximum of 12 years or a combined total of 12 years in both the State Assembly and Senate. So TG could conceivably hang out in Sacramento for another 8 years. But he's back to San Diego to run for mayor.
That’s not to say that being mayor hasn’t been on TG’s mind for a while. He clearly enjoyed--and made the most of--his 6-month stint as San Diego’s interim mayor, a post he held in 2013 following his dubious partnership with former City Attorney Jan Goldsmith during the orchestrated undoing of Mayor Bob Filner.
That wasn't the only odd coupling in the saga of Filner’s election as mayor (although it was the most toxic). TG’s domestic partner Jason Barsi had hooked up professionally with the mayoral campaign of Filner’s Republican opponent Bonnie Dumanis.
Meantime, the high school daughter of not-yet assemblymember Lorena Gonzalez made a surprisingly sizable campaign contribution to Nathan Fletcher, at that time also one of Filner's Republican opponents. Fletcher's budding relationship with Gonzalez was already bearing fruit.
(Targeted from the start by presumed Democratic allies, the hapless super-liberal Bob Filner never stood a chance. But that’s a story for another day.)
In today’s mayoral race, here’s what distinguishes TG from his opponents: TG is a seasoned city politician who has already captured early support among Democratic Party regulars, labor unions, the hotel industry, and major developers.
The assortment of power-brokers and lobbyists in his corner is impressive. Financial backers include hoteliers Bill Evans, C. Terry Brown, and Richard Bartell, SeaWorld, Sempra Energy, Ace Parking, Cox Communications, Cush Enterprises, CA Association of Realtors, CA Building Industry Association, Chevron, CA State Building & Construction Trades Council, OliverMcMillan, and--recently in the news--private prison contractors doing business with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
But there’s a flip side to being a seasoned city politician. After two terms as city councilmember TG left a paper trail, a political record, for all to see. Once you refresh your memory about his time on the city council you'll be faced with a thorny question: would TG make a good mayor, anyway… despite much of his recorded performance?
As councilmember:
TG engineered the establishment of the Balboa Park Conservancy, whose mission is to raise funds to maintain and improve the park (Balboa Park is in TG’s council district). But the Conservancy stumbled, sputtered, and languished under his negligent supervision…
TG defied 1) public objections, 2) a lawsuit brought by Cory Briggs, and 3) strong opposition from incoming mayor Bob Filner by forging ahead with an unprecedented 40-year lease extension to the Bahia Hotel in Mission Bay, owned by financial backer Bill Evans...
TG actively supported the Qualcomm/Irwin Jacobs makeover plan in Balboa Park for a bypass bridge and city-financed paid parking lot. Filner opposed the plan and, after becoming mayor, took steps to create a pedestrian friendly Plaza de Panama by eliminating surface parking spots…
As council president:
TG chafed mightily under Bob Filner’s ascendency as San Diego’s progressive new mayor. The two engaged in a fierce public rivalry over who was the city’s rightful top dog…
TG conspired with the City Attorney to deny legal support to Bob Filner, an underhanded and unethical tactic to force the mayor to resign or face bankruptcy...
TG climbed to the top of the bandwagon in support of public funding for the Convention Center expansion...
TG sidestepped honest analysis of the San Diego worker pension morass, replicating evasive practices of previous city councils to conceal damaging budget impacts from public view…
TG improperly pressured a city planner (according to court documents) to reverse report findings over a disputed expansion of the Academy of our Lady of Peace, a private religious school. This unethical manipulation cost the city more than half a million dollars in legal settlement fees...
As interim mayor:
TG used his 6-month stint as interim mayor to speedily reverse, undo, and overturn numerous decisions and processes put into place by the elected Mayor Filner…
TG put up roadblocks to renegotiating improved terms for the city regarding a tourism marketing deal with San Diego hoteliers, dismantling Filner’s early efforts…
TG overstepped his job description as temporary mayor and hired consultant Stephen Goldsmith to reorganize city government. Goldsmith was an "efficiency expert" in privatizing government services and in the sale of city functions to the private sector...
TG promptly rehired two lobbying firms, previously rejected by ex-mayor Filner but favored by Jerry Sanders and the Chamber of Commerce. Peculiar choices for a progressive politician…
TG rescinded a stop-use order issued by ex-Mayor Filner to prevent zoning code violations by the neighborhood restaurant chain Jack in the Box. In doing so he overstepped his authority as interim caretaker, turned his back on North Park residents, and reassured big-business backers...
TG reversed a program--previously funded by Mayor Filner--to keep shelters open year-round, thus impeding the city's ability to provide emergency shelters as needed. Closing cold weather shelters eventually led to a deadly outbreak of Hepatitis A just a few years later…
More as councilmember:
TG boldly claimed credit for promoting a much-sought after minimum wage law—an ordinance that had, months earlier, been achieved for contractors doing work for the city by then-Mayor Filner. In a bizarre twist, TG negotiated worse terms by scaling back the wage increase from Filner’s $13/hour to $11/hour. Who had the last laugh on this one?...
TG claimed authorship of San Diego’s Climate Action Plan, which must come as a big surprise to the plan originator Nicole Capretz, who had coordinated with ex-Mayor Filner…
TG dropped the ball in creating San Diego's Balboa Park Centennial Celebration, which was to be a spectacular citywide festival. Through failed leadership and lack of oversight it landed as a disastrous flop. TG promptly blamed ousted Mayor Filner for having unduly raised expectations...
If there's one thing we can all agree on, it's this: bad things happen to a city under bad leadership and bad management. Next time around we need a good mayor.
So the question for voters remains: is Todd Gloria's proliferation of political warts--scattered across many unexpected places--a dependable indicator of what we can expect from him in the future? Nobody’s perfect. The question is, would he be good enough?
Our next installment looks at mayoral candidate Barbara Bry.
Labels: Balboa Park, mayor's race, San Diego politics, Todd Gloria
Norma Damashek is a long-time civic activist who focuses on promoting decision-making that serves the public good.
She has spearheaded community-based coalitions and served on city and regional-government task forces and as past president of San Diego's League of Women Voters.
Her NumbersRunner commentaries have received multiple awards from the Society of Professional Journalists, San Diego Chapter.
ANATOMY OF FAILURE is my first-hand account of political decision-making inside City Hall -- where politics, planning, and personality converge to shape the San Diego landscape. Originally published as a master's thesis, ANATOMY OF FAILURE is on the "Reading List for the San Diego Newcomer" compiled by the Voice of San Diego. You can read it HERE
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025. July 13/26 1966
May 3, 2016 Letters
Dear Gleb,
Here is the revised manuscript. It will take 3 pages in our magazine. It you translate it for ____, tell Fr. Constantine that it will appear in English in our magazine, so he won’t try to print it himself in English.
Archimandrite Amvrossy was in this morning; he saw Vladika in a dream last night: he was in white vestments (as in the tomb) censing, and he gave a blessing with the word “_______” — and Batyshka awoke with a feeling of peace and joy. He also saw St. Mark of Ephesus in a dream before he had seen a icon of him. He’s a good man, even if he’s a little crazy He’s discouraged about doing any more scholarship — too much petty work, too little time. We’ll have to try to inspire him!
Sunday night I received an inspiring telephone call from your Dr. Nicholas Petrochko. We talked half-an hour. He’s just came back from the Holy Land and says everyone is strongly against Athenagoras and for Metr. Philaret. The Boston icon of St. Mark of Ephesus is everywhere. He ordered subscriptions for St. Sabbas Monastery, the library of the Patriarch of Jerusalem, and the Dutch Monastery in The Hague, and gave me the name of a Br. Basil to correspond with in Holland. His son is travelling with Fr. Alypy — Fr. Alypy has been refused permission to visit Athos, by the way. I promised Dr. Petrochko to make you write him (he wrote you several months ago and never received an answer); he says you can’t be busier than he is, since he works 20 hours a day.
Dr. Nicholas Petrochko He ordered
631 Valley View Dr. 30 copies
Endwell, N.Y 13763 of this issue
Eric was in today, and I tried to cheer him up a little.
Pray for me.
In Christ, your brother,
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Navalakha, N G. (1997). Effect of Synectics and Gaming Upon the Self – Concept Creativity and Achievement of the Learners. Unpublished. Ph.D., Education. Ahilya Vishwavidyalaya.
The objectives of study were: (1) To study the effect of Synectics Model (SM), Gaming Strategy (GS) and Traditional Method (TM) of instruction respectively on the Self-concept of the learners. (2) To compare the effect of Synectics Model (SM) and Gaming Strategy (GS) on the Self-concept of the learners. (3) To compare the effect of Synectics Model (SM) and Traditional Method (TM) on the Self-concept of the learners. (4) To compare the effect of Gaming Strategy (GS) and Traditional Method (TM) on the Self-concept of the learners. (5) To compare the Self-concept score of learners, on pre and post test taught through Synectics Model (SM), Gaming Strategy (GS) and Traditional Method (TM) respectively. (6) To study the effect of Synectics Model (SM), Gaming Strategy (GS) and Traditional Method (TM) of instruction respectively on the creativity of the learners. (7) To compare the effect of Synectics Model (SM) and Gaming Strategy (GS) on the creativity of the learners. (8) To compare the effect of Synectics Model (SM) and Traditional Method (TM) on the creativity of the learners.(9) To compare the effect of Gaming Strategy (GS) and Traditional Method (TM) on the creativity of the learners. (10) To compare the creativity score of learners, on pre and post test taught through Synectics Model (SM), Gaming Strategy (GS) and Traditional Method (TM) respectively. (11) To study the effect of Synectics Model (SM), Gaming Strategy (GS) and Traditional Method (TM) of instruction respectively on the achievement of the learners. (12) To compare the effect of Synectics Model (SM) and Gaming Strategy (GS) on the achievement of the learners. (13) To compare the effect of Synectics Model (SM) and Traditional Method (TM) on the achievement of the learners.(14) To compare the effect of Gaming Strategy (GS) and Traditional Method (TM) on the achievement of the learners. (15) To compare the achievement score of learners, on pre and posttest taught through Synectics Model (SM), Gaming Strategy (GS) and Traditional Method (TM) respectively. (16) To see the effect of treatments (SM, GS and TM) towards self – concept and their interaction with sex of the learners. (17) To see the effect of treatments (SM, GS and TM) towards creativity and their interaction with sex of the learners. (18) To see the effect of treatments (SM, GS and TM) towards achievement and their interaction with sex of the learners. (19) To see the effect of treatments (SM, GS and TM) towards self – concept and their interaction with Socio Economic Status (SES) of the learners. (20) To see the effect of treatments (SM, GS and TM) towards creativity and their interaction with Socio Economic Status (SES) of the learners. (21) To see the effect of treatments (SM, GS and TM) towards achievement and their interaction with Socio Economic Status (SES) of the learners.
The hypotheses of study were – (1) There will be no significant difference in the mean gain Self-concept scores of the learners taught through SM, GS and TM. (2) There will be no significant difference in the mean gain Self-concept scores of the learners taught through SM and GS. (3) There will be no significant difference in the mean gain Self-concept scores of the learners taught through SM and TM. (4) There will be no significant difference in the mean gain Self-concept scores of the learners taught through GS and TM. (5) There will be no significant difference between the pre and post test mean Self-concept scores of the learners taught through SM. (6) There will be no significant difference between the pre and post test mean Self-concept scores of the learners taught through GS. (7) There will be no significant difference between the pre and posttest mean Self-concept scores of the learners taught through TM. (8) There will be no significant difference in the mean gain creativity scores of the learners taught through SM, GS and TM. (9) There will be no significant difference in the mean gain creativity scores of the learners taught through SM and GS. (10) There will be no significant difference in the mean gain creativity scores of the learners taught through SM and TM. (11) There will be no significant difference in the mean gain creativity scores of the learners taught through GS and TM. (12) There will be no significant difference between the pre and post test mean creativity scores of the learners taught through SM. (13) There will be no significant difference between the pre and post test mean creativity scores of the learners taught through GS. (14) There will be no significant difference between the pre and posttest mean creativity scores of the learners taught through TM. (15) There will be no significant difference in the mean gain achievement scores of the learners taught through SM, GS and TM. (16) There will be no significant difference in the mean gain achievement scores of the learners taught through SM and GS. (17) There will be no significant difference in the mean gain achievement scores of the learners taught through SM and TM. (18) There will be no significant difference in the mean gain achievement scores of the learners taught through GS and TM. (19) There will be no significant difference between the pre and post test mean achievement scores of the learners taught through SM. (20) There will be no significant difference between the pre and post test mean achievement scores of the learners taught through GS. (21) There will be no significant difference between the pre and posttest mean achievement scores of the learners taught through TM. (22) There will be no sex related significant effect of three treatments (SM, GS and TM) upon Self-concept of the learners. (23) There will be no significant effect of sex upon Self-concept of learners. (24) There will be no significant effect of interaction between the treatment and sex upon the Self-concept of the learner. (25) There will be no sex related significant effect of three treatments (SM, GS and TM) upon creativity of the learners. (26) There will be no significant effect of sex upon creativity of learners. (27) There will be no significant effect of interaction between the treatment and sex upon the creativity of the learner. (28) There will be no sex related significant effect of three treatments (SM, GS and TM) upon achievement of the learners. (29) There will be no significant effect of sex upon achievement of learners. (30) There will be no significant effect of interaction between the treatment and sex upon the achievement of the learner. (31) There will be no Socio Economic Status (SES) related significant effect of three treatments (SM, GS and TM) upon Self-concept of the learners. (32) There will be no significant effect of Socio Economic Status (SES) upon the Self-concept of learners. (33) There will be no Socio Economic Status (SES) related significant effect of three treatments (SM, GS and TM) upon creativity of the learners. (34) There will be no significant effect of Socio Economic Status (SES) upon creativity of learners. (35) There will be no significant effect of interaction between the treatment and Socio Economic Status (SES) upon the creativity of the learner. (36) There will be no Socio Economic Status (SES) related significant effect of three treatments (SM, GS and TM) upon achievement of the learners. (37) There will be no significant effect of Socio Economic Status (SES) upon achievement of learners. (38) There will be no significant effect of interaction between the treatment and Socio Economic Status (SES) upon the achievement of the learner.
A sample of 170 Students of Grade VI were Purposive selected from Bal Vinay Mandir, Indore.
Verbal Intelligence Test by Ojha and Choudhary, Socio – Economic Status Scale by Kulshreshtha, Self – Concept Rating Scale by Deo, Vebal Creativity Test by Mehdi and Achievement Test was developed by researcher for data collection.
In this study Experimental Control Group Pre – Test, Post Test design was used. 60 Working days with two hours treatment each day was divided for during treatment stage.
The data were analyzed with the help of Mean, SD, t – Test and ANOVA.
The findings of study were – (1) There instructional treatments SM, GS and TM produced significant variations in the Self-concept of the learners. (2) No significant difference was found between the Self-concept score of groups receiving SM and GM, but SM treatment was found to superior to GS. (3) Significant variation was found between the Self-concept scores of SM and TM group. The SM treatment was found to superior to TM one is enhancing the Self-concept of the learners. (4) GS and TM treatment also produced significant variations in their Self-concept scores. GS treatment was found to superior to TM in enhancing the Self-concept of the learners. (5) The SM treatment produced significant difference between pre and post test Self-concept scores of the students. The post test mean scores were higher than pre test mean scores. (6) The post test mean and SD of Self-concept scores of GS were also found higher than pre test mean score and SD. (7) The TM treatment group did not show significant effect on Self-concept scores of the learners but post test Self-concept scores of TM treatment group were found higher than pre test ones. (8) There instructional treatment SM, GS and TM produced no significant variation on the mean gain creativity scores of the learners. (9) No significant difference was found between the mean creativity scores of SM and GM, but SM treatment was found superior to GS for enhancing the creativity of the learners. (10) No significant variation was between the creativity scores of SM and TM group, Though SM treatment was found superior to Tm treatment in enhancing the creativity of the learners. (11) GS and TM treatments did not show statistically significant variance on mean gain creativity scores of learners of the two groups, although GS treatment was found superior to TM in enhancing the creativity of the learners. (12) No significant difference was observed between pre and post test mean creativity scores of learners as results of SM treatment. But an improvement was indicated by higher post test mean scores. (13) No significant difference was found between pre and post test mean creativity scores of GS treatment group. But an improvement was evidenced by higher post test scores. (14) No significant variation was between pre and post test mean creativity scores of TM treatment group. Comparing the value of pre test and post test mean score slight difference was noticed. (15) Three instructional methods SM, GS and TM produced significant variations on the mean achievement scores of the learners of three groups. (16) No significant difference was found between the mean achievement scores of SM and GM groups of learners, but SM treatment was found to superior to GS in enhancing the achievement of the learners. (17) SM and TM treatments produced significant variance on mean gain achievement scores but SM treatment was found to superior to TM treatment. (18) The GS and TM treatments produced statistically significant variance on achievement mean gain scores and the GS treatment was found superior than TM treatment. (19) Significant variance was found between pre and post test mean achievement scores of SM treatment group. Thus Synectics treatment leads to improvement in the achievement of the learners (20) Significant difference was found between pre and post test mean achievement scores of GS treatment group. Thus the gaming treatment also effected improvement in pupils achievement. (22) No significant difference was found between pre and post test mean achievement scores of TM treatment group. Thus traditional mode of teaching did not enhance pupil’s achievement. (23) No significant effect of interaction between treatments and sex upon the Self-concept of the learners was found. (24) Mean over all creativity scores of the boys and girls belonging to three levels of treatment (SM, GS and TM) differed significantly but no significant effect of sex on creativity of the learners was discernible. (25) No significant effect of interaction between the treatments and sex upon the creativity of the learners was exhibited. (26) Mean over all achievement scores of the boys and girls belonging to three treatments (SM, GS and TM) differed significantly and also significant effect of sex on achievement of the learners was observed. (27) No significant effect of interaction between treatments and sex upon the achievement of the learners was found. (28) Mean over all Self-concept scores of the average SES and low SES belonging to three treatments (SM, GS and TM) did not differed significantly and also no significant effect of SES on Self-concept of the learners was observed. (29) No significant effect of interaction between treatments and SES upon the Self-concept of the learners was found. (30) Mean over all creativity scores of the average SES and low SES belonging to three treatments (SM, GS and TM) differed significantly and also significant effect of SES on creativity of the learners was discerned. (31) No significant effect of interaction between treatments and SES upon the Self-concept of the learners was found. (32) Mean over all achievement scores of the average SES and low SES belonging to three treatments (SM, GS and TM) differed significantly and also significant effect of SES on achievement of the learners was observed. (33) No significant effect of interaction between treatments and SES upon the achievement of the learners was discerned.
Keyword(s): Achievement of Learners
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Home > Pics > Nude peta pics
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Why would you preserve [a building] just so someone can make a profit by continuing to hurt and kill individuals who feel every bit as much as we do? PETA itself faced legal action in April after the owners of a chinchilla ranch in Michigan complained about an undercover inquiry there, but the judge ruled in PETA's favor that undercover investigations can be legitimate.
The ads featuring barely clad or naked women have been criticized by some feminist animal rights advocates. Georgia Agriculture Commissioner Tommy Irvin was tasked with licensing the shelters and enforcing the new law, through the department's Animal Protection Division. Kendra lust lesbian porn. Nude peta pics. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals v. But as the surplus of cats and dogs artificially engineered by centuries of forced breeding declined, eventually companion animals would be phased out, and we would return to a more symbiotic relationship—enjoyment at a distance.
The purpose is to advocate for a vegan diet, which fits their ideological agenda. They were mostly students and members of the local vegetarian society, but the group included a friend of Pacheco's from the U.
Continuum International Publishing Group,pp. PETA claims that for "35 years, dogs have suffered in cruel muscular dystrophy experiments Now, local animal rights donations go to PETA, rather than to a local group.
The group regularly protests the use of animals in entertainment, including circuses. In an interview for Wikinews a sister project of Wikipedia which is a news website inshe said she had been asked by other animal protection groups to condemn illegal acts.
The rabbits are then thrown back into their cage and appear to be stunned and in shock. Ina North Carolina grand jury handed down indictments against pig-farm workers on Belcross Farm in Camden County, the first indictments for animal cruelty on a factory farm in the United States, after a three-month PETA investigation produced film of the workers beating the animals. The campaign has attracted significant media attention, controversy and generated angry responses from the victims' family members.
Retrieved August 5, PETA's operation of an animal shelter has drawn scrutiny from lawmakers and criticism from animal rights activists. Lesbian old young videos. The first package was picked up by a PETA employee, Maria Blanton, and the second intercepted by the authorities, who identified the handwriting as Coronado's.
These demonstrations are specific to the area, including anti-bull riding, [] not keeping wild animals in chains, [] and stopping human—animal wrestling matches. Inthe Virginia General Assembly passed a measure aimed at curtailing the operations of its shelter that makes almost no attempt to save animals. Animal rights and Veganism.
Gary Francioneprofessor of law at Rutgers School of Law-Newark, argues that PETA is not an animal rights group—and further that there is no animal rights movement in the United States—because of their willingness to work with industries that use animals to achieve incremental change.
The New York Times reported the investigation as showing workers stomping on live chickens, throwing dozens against a wall, tearing the head off a chicken to write graffiti, strangling one with a latex glove, and squeezing birds until they exploded.
Prior to that time, gas chambers and other means were commonly employed. However, Commissioner Irvin failed to abide by the terms of the law, [] [] and instead continued to license gas chambers.
A proponent of abolitionismFrancione argues that PETA is trivializing the movement with what he calls the "Three Stooges" theory of animal rights, making the public think progress is underway when the changes are only cosmetic. Newkirk has replied to the criticism that no one is being exploited, the women taking part are volunteers, and if sexual attraction advances the cause of animals, she is unapologetic. Sexual attraction is a fact of life, and if it can advance the animals' cause, she makes no apologies for using it.
Changing Minds, Changing Practices". Eternal TreblinkaLantern Books,
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Mike Fahey of Kotaku opined that New Super Chick Sisters "manages to be a rather capable little platformer despite its heavy-handed message.
A nonprofit corporation with nearly employees, it claims that it has 6. Milf in bangalore. National Press Books,p. Other recent PETA investigations have focused on crocodile and alligator farms in Texas and Zimbabwe[91] a monkey breeding facility in Florida[92] pigeon racing in Taiwan[93] ostrich slaughterhouses and tanneries in South Africa[94] and a dairy farm in North Carolinawhere cows were "wading knee deep through thousands of gallons of their own manure.
Reflections on the Liberation of Animals. Unpredictable and variable symptoms lend themselves to confirmation bias, with a strong tendency to lead to the anecdotal experience that whatever is being looked for is real. He then used restraint, electric shock, and withholding of food and water to force the monkeys to use the deafferented parts of their bodies.
Retrieved August 5, Retrieved 17 March PETA is critical of television personalities they call self-professed wildlife warriors, arguing that while a conservationist message is getting across, some of the actions are harmful to animals, such as invading animals' homes, netting them, subjecting them to stressful environments, and wrestling with them—often involving young animals the group says should be with their mothers.
Cows and Chickens and Naked Celebs! Retrieved August 12, PETA's work has drawn the ire of some feminists who argue that the organization sacrifices women's rights to press its agenda. For example, many parents believe that sugar makes their children hyperactive, when this is simply not true. Yum Brands, owner of KFC, called the video appalling and threatened to stop purchasing from Pilgrim's Pride if no changes were made.
The Mind and the Brain: After the video footage aired on British television ina group of activists set up Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty to close HLS down, a campaign that continues.
Also see Rosenberg, Howard. Nude peta pics. When the department continued to license a gas chamber in Cobb Countya second court action was brought, which resulted in the department being held in contempt.
Neuroplasticity and the Power of Mental Forcecurledup. For the "five people in a basement" quote, see Schwartz, Jeffrey and Begley, Sharon. Images of kaley cuoco naked. If you say something that someone already agrees with, then what's the point, and so we make some more conservative animal protection organizations uncomfortable; they don't want to be associated with us because it will be embarrassing for them, and I understand that.
Overview Archived at the Wayback Machine. Archived from the original on 13 November The case led to the first police raid in the United States on an animal laboratory, triggered an amendment in to the United States Animal Welfare Act, and became the first animal-testing case to be appealed to the United States Supreme Court, [5] which upheld a Louisiana State Court ruling that denied PETA's request for custody of the monkeys.
In some cases, the creators of the original games have responded to PETA's parodies. There would be no pet shops. Help free Princess Pam and rescue the chickens from McDonald's cruelty!
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Curved Lines, Dried Materials
Nageire, curved lines, dried and fresh materials.
Midelino sticks, jute fibre textile, Carnations.
I'm following up my last blog post, about arrangements to be viewed from all angels, with a somewhat similar design using dried materials instead of fresh branches.
This is a smaller sized arrangement with a more abstract Sogetsu ikebana look. My teacher suggested trying out working with Midelino sticks and pieces of fibre textile in a design with curved lines, and this was the result.
Midelino sticks is a flower design product made from rattan. It is without glaze and is very flexible, so it can be bent into many different shapes. If you cut the end pointed and use a sharp object to make a small hole somewhere on the stick you can fix the end of the stick quite firmly in this hole.
Four Faces
Linden tree, Hyacinth and Statice.
To be viewed from all angles.
Every flower has a face. One of the surprising things I discovered when starting doing ikebana is how much differens it makes if you make the mistake of placing a flower so that it is looking down instead of letting it face the sun. It you hold a flower diagonally in your hand and turn the stem with your fingers you will see what I mean. It may look symmetrical and even, but it is not - it has a face.
Traditionally, ikebana arrangements that are placed in the tokonoma alcove, are designed to face the viewer sitting in front of it. Contemporary ikebana can often be seen from all angles and can be placed in the middle of a room.
Making an arrangement so that it can be seen from all angles is an important exercise in Sogetsu ikebana. When walking around the arrangment the shape will change more than you expect. The asymmetric design makes it look very different depending on the angle you're watching from. But there should always be some material facing you no matter where you stand. That's why these arrangements are sometimes named arrangements with four faces.
Veggie Revolt
Freestyle with vegetables.
Rhubarb, dudhi gourd, turnip, potatoes.
Freestyle arrangements with fruit and vegetables is a popular style of Sogetsu ikebana. The idea is to make use of the shape, colour and texture of the fruit, when composing a modern, sculptural arrangement. It can be an arrangement with fruits only, or a combination of fruits, leaves and flowers.
This freestyle arrangement is a further development of the more traditional morimono style, which in the Sogetsu school is a basic style arrangement on a tray, with fruits or vegetables, roots and flowers, representing the shin, soe and hikae elements.
While fruit offerings have a long history, both in traditional Japanese culture and in Buddhism, the first morimono style ikebana appeared in the mid 18th century, as part of the litterati or bunjin movement. Japanese literati style was inspired by the Chinese, but since Japan was cut of from the outside world in this time, the influences were sparse and the Japanese bunjin came to develop a style of their own.
Yanagisawa Kien, Images of January, May and September.
Hanging scrolls, 1750s.
The bunjin movement was a revolt against orthodoxy, with its increasing focus on techniques and details. Idealizing the sensibilities of Chinese scholars and painters, the intellectuals preferred a more informal, personal expression. The intellectual, or literati, should ideally be a master of all the core traditional arts - painting, calligraphy, and poetry. Mastering flower arrangement was also in their portfolio. Seeing themselves as renewers of Japanese culture, they developed a category of new freestyle arrangements that are known as bunjin-ike or bujinbana.
Being an informal style, bunjinbana is similar to nageire and to some extent to chabana, but it has a stronger focus on the beauty of the plant materials and a freer approach to form and combination of flowers and vase. While chabana breathes the austerity of the tea house, the bunjinbana expresses the taste of bunjin, the man of literature. It is characterized by personal expression, unorthodoxy, a casual character, and a new richness of color and literary nuance adopted from the Chinese art. Today the Ohara school is the strongest exponent of bunjin style ikebana.
The morimono style of the bunjin consisted of vegetables, flowers, fruits, sometimes roots, especially from Lotus plants, or rocks, placed on a plate, a basket, or even specially made dishes formed as banana leaves. The bunjinga painter Yanagisawa Kien (1703-1758) is especially well known for his paintings of arrangements with fruits, that has served as models for morimono.
Yanagisawa Kien, Orchid and Pears.
Hanging scroll, painted silk, H. 57.6 cm, W. 37.9 cm.
Masses - Naturalistic and Abstract
Mass, moribana, abstract freestyle.
Roses, Carnations, Pine.
Grouping materials together to form masses is one of the most commonly used design elements in contemporary ikebana. Masses can work as a contrast to lines and to open spaces. They also add weight to an arrangement, and works as a focus point that makes the over all impression peaceful.
When masses are used in abstract arrangements, it is crucial to arrange the materials in a distinct form. In Sogetsu ikebana masses are kept in geometrical forms, like circles, ovals or squares. This gives a contemporary look, and if you are successful a rather dramatic effect.
Mass and line, nageire, naturalistic freestyle.
Apple branch, Roses, Carnations.
Sakura Poetry
Sweet cherry, Statice, Pine.
Variation no. 1, upright nageire.
click-clack
go the wooden clogs...
cherry blossoms!
.からからと下駄をならして桜哉
kara-kara to geta wo narashite sakura kana
Haiku by Issa 1811
(Translation by David G. Lanoue, haikuguy.com)
Sweet cherry, Hyacinth, Plastic, Pine.
Freestyle Kabuwake with unconventional materials.
Labels: Ikebana by Nordic Lotus, Poetry, Sogetsu School, 生け花, 草月
Hanakubari Workshop
The last weekend Ikebana International Oslo Chapter organized a two days workshop on Hanakubari techniques. We were lucky to have Yasuko Oki to teach us, and the workshop was quickly filled up with 21 participants from Norway, Sweden and Denmark. Yasuko worked for several years as a teacher, designer and manager at Mami flower design school while she still lived in Japan. Now she is a florist based in Oslo and runs her own courses.
Every ikebana practitioner knows what a kubari is - the sticks we put in vases to fix branches and flowers in position. The kubari sometimes peeks out over the rim of the vase, but it is always carefully hidden with plant materials.
Hanakubari is contemporary flower design techniques, pioneered by the Japanese flower artist Keita Kawasaki. The idea is to let the kubari out of the darkness of the vase, and give it a more prominent place as a visible structure to support flowers. The Mami flower design school has developed innovative techniques for using branches, twigs, leaves, fruits and stones for this purpose.
Photo: Yasuko Oki
We all had a great time trying out different techniques at the workshop. These are some of the arrangements I made using twigs, branches and leaves.
Using branches as kubari.
Sorbus branches, Trachelium and Fritillaria.
Clipping technique.
Bird cherry (Prunus padus), Bellflower and Larkspur..
Wreath technique.
Phormium leaves, twigs, Hypericum berries, Allium and Chrysanthemum.
Using leaves as kubari.
Branch, Massed Salal leaves, Trachelium and Veronica.
Floating technique.
Horsetail (Equisetum) and Larkspur..
Labels: Ikebana by Nordic Lotus, Keita Kawasaki, 草月
The Last Sweet Cherry
Sweet cherry and Carnations.
Variation no. 4, slanting moribana.
There are many kinds of cherry trees. The Japanese count well over 300 different kinds of Sakura including wild ones and cultivars.
The cherry blossoms are said to remind us about the realities of human life. It can be beautiful in the moment, but it lasts for a short time only. That's why Sakura blossoming is associated with both beauty and melancholy. The tradition of gathering for parties under the cherry trees, in it's deepest sense is about enjoying life while it lasts.
The sweet cherry grows wild in some parts of Scandinavia. It is also a sturdy garden tree. It blossoms a bit later than its more fancy and delicate sisters. Sweet cherry plays the leading part in these two ikebana arrangements. The first is evoking the abundance of blossoms on a tree at its peek, the second one alludes the melancholy of Sakura. This last arrangement is an exercise in disassembling the material as rearranging it so as to highlight the beauty of every part of the branches.
Sweet cherry.
Ishu-ike, Disassembling and rearranging materials.
Crossing the Water
Forsythia, Cymbidium orchid and stones.
Focus on water, 'bridge arrangement'.
Water is essential for life and is also a very important element in ikebana. Water is life giving, refreshing and cooling, but also calming and creates a peaceful atmosphere.
There are many ways of emphasizing water in ikebana. The most important thing is to never add to much plant materials, and the use the flowers to point to the transparent character of the water. Transparency is a very important quality in Japanese aesthetics.
Arrangements that form a bridge over the water are ment to evoke a poetic notion of crossing into a different world.
To go with this bridge arrangement, I found two photos from a trip to the historic Japanese garden at The Huntington, Pasadena, a year ago. Enjoy!
Two Groups in Two Ways
Goat Willow (Salix caprea), Eustoma, Spirea.
Kabuwake freestyle.
Did you ever notice that branches of Goat Willow can have a quite strong colour? I was so surprised by the shiny yellow and red branches coming up from the base of an old tree, that had been taken down. The shape of these young branches varies from straight to slightly bent and elegantly curved.
I used these branches together with some other spring materials to illustrate the difference between the basic style Variation no. 5 and Free style kabuwake. The word kabuwake, meaning 'separated groups', is used for Variation no. 5 as well. In both styles the materials are divided into to distinct groups. These kind of arrangements build on the traditions from very old Rikka arrangements, that were splitt in the middle with two shin (main) lines, or just two groups allowing water two flow in between them as a fish path.
Variation no. 5 moribana kabuwake is a basic style with fixed rules for the lengths and placements of the branches. The two groups represents an arrangement that have been taken apart and divided into two parts, that are incomplete without each other. The open water surface between the two groups is the most important feature of this arrangement. The kabuwake freestyle is a freestyle arrangement that has been developed from Variation no. 5. The expression is freer and the arrangement more vertical. The open space on the water surface continues up between the branches, and creates a powerful open space full of energy.
Variation no. 5, moribana.
Forsythia and Calla lily 'Flamingo'.
Without kenzan.
The typical flowers for Girl's day, or Hinamatsuri on March 3rd., are pink Peach blossoms and yellow Rape flowers (Brassica napus). Pretty and humble, they are symbolizing youthful beauty and fertility. This festival is also called Momo no sekku, the Peach festival. In less traditional arrangements any pink and yellow flowers are acceptable.
In this contemporary ikebana arrangement without kenzan, I wanted to move away from the expectation of being pretty and humble and rather focus on girl power. At the flower market I found a bunch of unusual pink flamingo Calla lilies with powerful vertical lines - perfect for what I was aiming at.
Curved Lines in Basic Styles
Alder branches, Tulips, pine.
It's fun to play with curved lines in freestyle arrangements, but the energetic curves of springtime can also be expressed in basic styles, meaning styles with rules for how to place the branches in relation to each other and the vase.
In these two examples I've used the same branches and flowers as in one of the freestyle arrangements in my last blog post. Alder branches have naturally strong curves and also a nice variation in the texture of the material.
Variation no. 8, combination arrangement.
Lines of Springtime
Linden branches, Muscari grass, Hellebore.
In the Spring season it is still so much easier to see the lines of tree branches, than when the leaves have sprung and the tree crowns turns into a mass of green. Emphasizing straight and curved lines is important in Sogetsu school freestyle arrangements. Curved lines in the Spring are showing the increasing energy in nature, starting with a discreet bend and erupting with full power as it is getting warmer. When straight and curved lines are combined they are arranged so that they accentuate each other.
Straight and curved lines.
Alder branches, Salix branches, Tulips, paper bag.
The 49th Spring
Birch, Hydrangea, bamboo vases.
first spring morning
my 49th year
of blossoms
Haiku by Issa, 1811
Labels: Ceramics/containers, Ikebana by Nordic Lotus, Poetry, Sogetsu School, 生け花, 草月
Holiday Cinema - Revealing the Full Potential of Flowers
I found a really nice ikebana video that I want to share with you. If you can spare 30 minutes of your time, it well spent in my holiday cinema.
This video takes us to Kyoto, the old capital of Japan where traditions are handed down from generation to generation. You'll meet a nice mixture of people, all related to ikebana. At the Ikenobo school of ikebana you're welcomed by Yuki Ikenobo, headmaster designate, get a glimpse of the Ikenobo Research Institute and the remake of a huge Rikka arrangement made after a 400 years old description. You'll also meet a Kyoto pottery specializing in ikebana vases, an experienced florist visiting a client to create ikebana at a tea house, a blacksmith making ikebana scissors, and finally Ryuho Sasaoka, the young third generation headmaster of Misho-Ryu Sasaoka.
Labels: Ceramics/containers, Videos, 草月
Linden branches, Daffodil, Hellebore, Thuja.
Variation no.3 (fan style) slanting moribana.
Easter gives hope for tomorrow, as after the winter comes spring.
Thursday, 2 April 2015
Guests for Easter
Japanese Fantail Willow, mini Gerbera, Blue Thuja.
Ukibana, floating arrangement.
Easter is a big holiday here in Scandinavia. It marks the beginning of spring after the long winter and is a very happy occasion. Traditionally, since it is also the end of a religious fasting period, Easter is associated with an abundance of food and a cheerfully decorated table. Yellow Daffodils and Birch branches with fresh spring leaves spreads joy and new energy.
Although Easter has nothing to do with ikebana, making Easter ikebana makes sense in this special context. I've made two Sogetsu style table top arrangements designed to welcome guests to the house. In this season anything yellow will be recognized as bearers of Happy Easter greetings.
Japanese Fantail Willow, mini Gerbera, Taxus.
Shikibana, spreading arrangement.
Camille Henrot - ‘Is it possible to be revolutionary and like flowers?’
Have you also heard the statement "Ikebana is art!", and wondered what it really means?
From the advent of contemporary ikebana, and especially after World war 2, the discussion on ikebana has been influenced by a western understanding of art. From being a contemplative and highly regulated art form, ruled by tradition, it is now often understood as a means of self expression and individual creativity.
Recently this discussion has taken a new turn in western art, as ikebana works have been incorporated in concept art installations. Camille Henrot, a French artist based in New York, is maybe the most profiled exponent for this phenomenon. In the two year span of 2011-2013 she worked on the project "Is it possible to be a revolutionary and like flowers?", that was first exhibited in Paris. Last summer her work were on display at the New Museum in New York.
Following the idea that ikebana and books are related as bearers of language but also in their function to “console the soul”, Henrot created more than 100 arrangements in tribute to the books that make up her personal library. Some of the ikebana creations were then exhibited and photographed. In this process the books are subjected to "becoming flowers".
Henrot is a trained ikebana practitioner and have studied with the Sogetsu school of ikebana. Each of her ikebana is created to represent a literary work, following a principle of reinventing the coded language that decides the shape of the arrangement and the use of flowers in traditional ikebana. Reassigning traditional ikebana codes Henrot uses the Latin and common names of the flowers, the names designed for their commercial exploitation, their pharmacological power and sometimes even the history of their travels. For example, in the ikebana piece that pays homage to the book Caractère fétiche de la merchandise (The fetishistic nature of consumer goods) she uses a rose named “freedom” and three carnations.
The coded language in Henrot's work reminds me of the allegoric messages in old European paintings, where objects and flowers are added to the composition to tell a coded story. Even though flowers are used as message bearers in ikebana, this language in my experience is often more concerned with what is understood as the inner character of the plants, than of a direct representation of an idea that can be associated with a specific flower.
Seen separately, the ikebana works have clear references to contemporary ikebana and to iconic works by Sofu Teshigahara, founder of the Sogetsu school. Put together as an exhibition or a "library", the works must also be seen in relation to installation art and assemblages of natural materials and found objects.
So what happens to ikebana when it is no longer an artform in it self, but is incorporated in an installation? There are similarities between ikebana and installation art. For example, ikebana is always site-specific, or at least site-sensitive. But there are also differences. Concept art is preoccupied with an idea, a concept, whereas ikebana is much more starting with the materials themselves, working towards a conceptual expression.
Henrot's installations have been categorized as "ikebana inspired sculptures". Discussing them herself, she calls them "heterodox ikebana", deliberately based on certain naiveties and even misinterpretations of the fundamentals of ikebana: "I like to remove segments of culture in partial and unfinished manners in order to grow them in the fertilizer of my work".
The ikebana works by Camille Henrot are being recognized as art. But are they also still ikebana? If so, with their reassigned language code and close dependence on the concept of litteratur and libraries, they certainly offer a different answer to the question what ikebana can be today.
PS: If you wonder about the title "Is it possible to be revolutionary and like flowers?", it is borrowed from Leninism under Lenin, written by Marcel Liebman in 1973, and refers to flowers as being seductive: “You start by loving flowers and soon you want to live like a landowner, who, stretched out lazily in a hammock, in the midst of his magnificent garden, reads French novels and is waited on by obsequious footmen.”
Photo courtesy: © Camille Henrot / Photo. Fabrice Seixas Courtesy the artist and kamel mennour, Paris
Labels: Exhibitions, Modern Art, Sogetsu School, 生け花
Contrasting Branches
Apple branches, Macedonian pine, Forsythia.
Using branches only.
Sometimes things becomes clearer when you see them in relation to their opposite. The differences helps define what I'm not and who I am.
Putting together branches with different appearance and opposite characters helps making a stronger impression. Each of the branches stick out when contrasted with each other. They are not all the same. At this time of the year some are bare, some are evergreen and some are richly blossoming.
colorful birds
set free in the trees...
Issa, 1788
Labels: Ikebana by Nordic Lotus, Philosophy, Poetry, Sogetsu School, 生け花, 草月
An Unexpected Meeting
Flexible metal pipe, jute fibre, polyester rope, Calla lily 'Green Goddess'.
"I see trees differently after I started studying ikebana" - the words were my class mate's when we sat on the bus on the way to our ikebana teacher and watched the bare branches of the trees passing by outside the window. Our ikebana practice is full of unexpected meetings with all kinds of plant materials.
Studying with the Sogetsu school, we are also encouraged to see manmade materials with new eyes, integrating them in the ikebana creations. It makes me think about the differences between natural and manmade materials. I've come to the conclusion that everything we do, is reorganizing materials that surrounds us. We are ourselves part of nature, and all the things we make are basically, in one way or another made from nature. Therefore there isn't much difference between arranging living plant materials and plastic or metal.
Lead sheet, bast yarn, Calla lily 'Green Goddess', Sibirian dogwood.
When we arrived at our teachers studio, I was met by a big box filled with all kinds of odd objects and materials. I had brought a bunch of interesting Calla lilies named 'Green Goddess', perfect for a sculptural contemporary arrangement. My exercise that day was to approach the stuff in the box as if viewed for the first time. These three ikebana arrangements is what I came up with. Let the unexpected meeting inspire your creativity!
Felted wool, Calla lily 'Green Goddess', Sibirian dogwood, coloured jute, pine.
Of Mice and Flowers
Plastic building material, Aspidistra, Pincushion flower.
Curved, straight and radiating lines.
With the introduction of abstract freestyle ikebana came a strong trend, in the postwar period, of experimenting with different manmade materials in the compositions. The Sogetsu school and its founder Sofu Teshigahara were leading this development, focusing on the sculptural form and the shape and character of the materials.
In this kind of ikebana arrangement the manmade material plays the leading role. Adding too much naturalistic looking plant materials will only confuse the design. The material is used in a surprising way making it look unknown and different. This helps seeing things as if you have never seen them before.
If I am not mistaken the plastic material used in these two arrangements is a product preventing mice from getting inn behind the exterior wall cladding of houses.
Curved lines. Two containers.
Holiday Cinema - Revealing the Full Potential of F...
Camille Henrot - ‘Is it possible to be revolutiona...
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This delightful OO gauge working model of Medstead & Four Marks station on the preserved Watercress Line could soon be going to the local tip if a new custodian cannot be found.
Sadly its creator passed away a couple of years ago and now his widow needs to downsize which means that this cracking model of this well known Watercerss Line station needs to go to a new home or tragically be broken up.
The layout is a permanent layout which has been built into the loft room, but having examined it, I think with a little careful use of a jig saw and Dremel to slit the track to create some baseboard joins for extraction through the loft hatch. later reassembly at its new home could consist of a simple sub baseboard which would support the original structure. The layout as seen here is around 75% complete, so there is plenty of scope for a new owner to make his or her mark on it whilst allowing its creator's vision to live on.
Fiddle yards are built into the property, so the the owner would need to build new ones, these could either make the layout form part of a roundy-roundy or end to end depending on location.
The size of the scenic section is around 10 feet long and about 2ft 6 inches deep, and to my eyes the station area looks to be around scale length as I discovered whilst trying to match my model shots to photos of the real station whilst shooting this delightful layout for a forthcoming Model Rail magazine.
There is no stock supplied, the locomotives and trains here being borrowed from a Mid Hants Railway driver for the shoot. But luckily most of the trains suitable for this model can be found ready to run, and of course it being a preserved railway means that almost anything will go!
The model is based near the Watercress Line in Hampshire, and If you'd like to discuss giving it a new home drop Eddie Field a line on eddie @ bussolutionssouth . co . uk (remove the gaps) who'll be able to give you more information and arrange a viewing for serious seekers.
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Last Updated: Monday, 22 January 2007, 14:24 GMT
Can you keep ship-wrecked goods?
WHO, WHAT, WHY?
The Magazine answers...
Salvaging is not illegal, but concealing goods would be
Beach-combers have been told to stay away, but scavengers are out on Branscombe beach in Devon, where booty is washing up from the stranded ship MSC Napoli. So can they keep what they find?
Brand new BMW motorbikes have been wheeled out of the shingle by keen treasure-hunters. Wine casks, perfume and car parts littering the shore have been rolled clear or tucked under the arm.
People are picking through the contents of spilt containers from the cargo ship MSC Napoli beached off the Devon coast and at night, the area is lit by flickering torches as they scour the area for goodies.
Warnings that chemicals such as battery acid, pesticide and oily liquids have also washed up, are proving little deterrent against the lure of "free stuff" littering the beach. But can people keep it?
So far, police have not closed off the beach to stop them coming.
A feature to the BBC News Magazine - aiming to answer some of the questions behind the headlines
People take beached goods
And there is, says Stephen Askins, a partner with maritime lawyers Ince and Co, a right to salvage property. Someone could argue they are recovering goods from the beach to protect them, as they would be in a poorer state come four or five tides' time.
But, before they clear the car boot and head to the coast, they should be aware of the Merchant Shipping Act 1995. It states clearly that if they try to conceal or keep the booty they are breaking the law.
If they ignore the advice to leave it alone and report it to the coastguard, they must fill in relevant paperwork. But that still doesn't allow them to keep it.
The goods still belong to their owners, whether they are stuck in containers on the stricken vessel, or washed up on the shore. Contractors have already been brought in to clean up the beach and return anything to its rightful home.
But when Joe Public decides to "help", as seems to be the case all over Branscombe beach, the Maritime and Coastguard Agency's Receiver of Wrecks steps in.
The job title goes back to the previous 1854 Merchant Shipping Act, which also set out rules on picking up flotsam and jetsam.
Casks of wine have been washed up on the beach
Salvage, and indeed deliberate wrecking of ships, around our island nation has a long history. The principles governing ownership and recovery go back at least to the 1300s says Alison Kentuck, the MCA's deputy receiver.
If people take the cargo, they fill in a "report of wreck and salvage" form, with their contact details, what they found, where and when. "It's available from pretty much anybody in uniform down on the beach", she says.
Her role is then to reunite owner and property. A reward to the finder could be offered, depending on the value of the goods, the condition they are in after rescue, and the effort involved in recovering them from the beach. Wheeling something home, she stresses, is "not classed as a huge amount of effort".
Hiding the goods and not giving them back is a criminal offence, with a possible fine of up to £2,500 per offence.
Plus, the hot-fingered beach-comber, would waive their right to a salvage award, and have to pay the owner twice the good's value: "In the case of a BMW motorbike, it could be quite expensive".
As for paddling out to see what the remaining 2,000 containers may hold, it is of course highly dangerous. And, would-be pirates note, there are official salvors charged with recovering the cargo stuck at sea, and the damaged ship itself.
Add your comments on this story, using the form below.
Devon will have some wonderful car boot sales this weekend.
Allyson Breeds, Langley UK
The law should be changed for large vessels such as this. Persons locating washed up goods could have the right to keep them. This would help encourage the shipping companies to get their act together and take better care of their cargo.
Simon Woodcock, Milton Keynes
It is good people are going down to retrieve the washed up items, good on them. If I lived any closer I know I would be there right now taking anything I could. And it is not against the law to do this, as long as you keep the salvaged items on show. Anyhow, companies such as BMW will not be asking for the motorbikes back. Once these bikes have been in the salt water the insurance company would write them off.
Luke Wieland, Harlow, Essex
Human Nature at its worst... very sad
Wendy Brown, Wigan
I do not condone pirating, but if I happened to come across an oak barrel of wine, I'd drink some and give some.
P. Chez, Baldwin Park, CA, USA
Removing items from the beach that have obviously been washed ashore from the damaged vessel, is no different that walking into a store and helping yourself to goods on the shelves. The local police and maritime authority have an obligation to close the beaches to not only prevent the ongoing looting but also ensuring no member of the public is injured in pursuit of bounty.
Scott Campbell, Aberdeen
I think the salvagers should be rightfully allowed to keep the goods collect from the beach. It is just the same as someone with a metal detector scouring for old loose change.
Kieran, Romford, Essex
Interesting story but I wish you were reporting on the dead dolphins and oiled sea birds that are washing up on Chesil beach in Portland, Dorset..
Pandora Elrington, London
Has nobody ever read Whisky Galore? I'm just of to book my train ticket to the beach and I would like to reserve that bit just by the cliffs to pitch my tent.
John, Bauge, France
Here in Shetland any wreck was assumed to be fair game for anyone who wanted to acquire a part of the cargo. In one district over 100 years ago where a vessel called the Gudrun was wrecked the cargo produced so much booty for the locals that for many years after anyone who got an unexpected acquisition was said to have got a Gudrun.
In another incident the Customs officer who arrived to remonstrate with the people removing goods from a wreck returned to his car to find it had mysteriously levitated over a wall.
John, Shetland
As a retired police inspector, I would advise you that in Scotland this would be classed as theft by finding. A finder's responsibility here is to hand such goods to the police as found property immediately or as soon as reasonably possible thereafter, or alert police to your find. A finder may receive a small percentage reward from the owner, and if not claimed within a specified period, the goods can be returned to the finder. This is a fair system, but the unlawful retention of someone else's property is a criminal offence. I would suspect that if these containers contained valuable jewellery more would be done about the current looting.
Hamish Tod, Milngavie, Scotland
If I loose something on a beach and someone else finds it, that's my tough luck and I learn to be more careful in future. But here, the mistakes of the mariners and those who chose to beach the ship here is somehow rewarded with legal protection? If they still have rights to the cargo, then they must also be held directly responsible for any damage that it causes and the cost of any cleaning up.
Alex D, Southampton, UK
Maybe as a gesture to the local environment and wildlife that this will undoubtedly harm, all the people who salvaged all the interesting stuff could all pop back to help out when the real damage is realised by all the uninteresting stuff (chemicals etc.).
Dan, UK
Town/city and country
The BBC may edit your comments and not all emails will be published. Your comments may be published on any BBC media worldwide.
Members of the public comb Branscombe beach
In today's Magazine
Big beasts
How elephants helped to shape human history, by David Cannadine
Change a-coming
Justin Webb on America's love affair with progress
Audience of one
Would you watch a play all on your own?
7 days quiz
What now for Paul the eight-limbed oracle?
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Paper Monitor, Your Letters, Quote of the Day, Caption Competition and more
Maritime and Coastguard Agency
Ince & Co
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An Evening of Comedy with Etta May
3 years ago ago by Genesee Community College.
What: An Evening of Comedy with Etta May
When: Friday, February 12, 2016, 7:30 p.m.
Where: Genesee Community College
Stuart Steiner Theatre
One College Road, Batavia, NY 14020
Background: “An Evening of Comedy with Etta May” will have you laughing in your seat on Friday, February 12, 2016 at 7:30 p.m. Learn the true meaning of LOL (laughing out loud) with an evening featuring the “Queen of Southern Sass” who is also the winner of American Comedy Awards’ “Stand-Up Comic of the Year.”
Etta May is a Kentucky woman and comedy icon! Hailed as the “Polyester Princess,” May delivers a high powered take-no-prisoners performance full of truth, irony, humor and wisdom. This trailer park goddess has appeared on Oprah, Showtime, CMT, CBS Sunday Morning, ABC, Columbia Pictures and NBC. She headlines the hugely successful Southern Fried Chicks Comedy Tour and touts a huge fan base on SiriusXM comedy channels. Etta May is a seasoned performer with national appeal!
Tickets to “An Evening of Comedy with Etta May” are $8 for adults, $5 for GCC faculty/staff and senior citizens, $3 for GCC students. Alumni with ID receive $2 off the full ticket price. Tickets are available through the GCC box office at (585) 345-6814 or via email boxoffice@genesee.edu.
For videos, press photos and further information on Etta May, visit www.ettamay.com.
For more information, contact Associate Director of Marketing and Communications Donna Rae Sutherland at (585) 343-0005 ext. 6616 or via email dsutherland@genesee.edu.
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Back Towards Normal
Mikel Rouse - Corner Loading volume 1
Spotlight on: Mikel Rouse
For a Song: Lullaby of Birdland
Rachel Harrington - Celilo Falls
That 70s Vibe
Grant Peeples - Okra and Ecclesiastes
For a Song: Complainte Pour Ste Catherine
Carrie Elkin - Call It My Garden
You could be forgiven for thinking that Celilo Falls must be somewhere in the American South. In fact, the falls were once to be found on the Columbia River, dividing the states of Oregon and Washington. In the early 1950s, the Dulles Dam was built on the river, and now those falls are gone. Progress? Perhaps, but something precious was lost, and metaphorically, Rachel Harrington wants us to hear what it was. The songs on this album are Harrington’s idea of what country music was about when it was still country. You will swear that these are traditional tunes, but they are not. Yes, Harrington performs Pretty Saro here, but she has given the song completely new lyrics. Spokane is a cover, but that one was written in Washington state in 2005. The rest of the songs are Harrington originals, but their evocation of the folk music of the American South is uncanny.
Bury Me Close is like a microcosm of how this album works. The song starts with Harrington singing and accompanying herself on acoustic guitar. Her voice is a fine folky alto with a Southern twang in the accent, and just a hint of smoke in the texture of her voice. Her singing is understated, but the emotions of each song come through loud and clear. On guitar, she picks her notes rather than strumming, and she gives herself solid support. You could say that this is all the song needs. But the lyric is very brief, and halfway through the song, Harrington has sung all of the words. At this point, a fiddle enters, and is soon joined by the rest of the band. From there, she sings the entire song again with the full band. So, in the space of one song, there are two arrangements, and each one is just what the song needs. Pretty Saro is done here as an a capella number, and it proves that Harrington can carry a song beautifully with just her voice. But there is a band on this album, and Harrington can add dobro or banjo, fiddle or pedal steel, mandolin, and/or stand-up bass. Here in My Bed has slide guitar, and You Don’t Know has a gentle harmonica part that is a wonder of delicacy. So Harrington sometimes uses all of the band, sometimes only some of it, and sometimes it’s just her and her guitar. In each case, Harrington makes the perfect choice of what the song needs.
Most of the lyrics sound traditional as well. He Started Building My Mansion in Heaven Today expresses a personal relationship between a Christian believer and his savior; the song was inspired by a remark that Harrington’s grandfather made. House of Cards concerns a card game turned sour, and is a wonderfully spare piece of story telling. The lyrics for Pretty Saro are new, as I mentioned, but they sound like a lost version. Only the lyrics of Goodbye Amsterdam sound new to me; here, Harrington describes traveling to old haunts throughout Europe without the company of a former romantic partner, and having to explain where that person is. It’s a beautifully rendered song, full of heartache, but it is the only one that does not sound like an old song. You’ll Do sounds traditional, but it belongs to a different tradition than the rest. This one sounds like a sultry old blues number. Harrington needs to sing this one a little differently than the rest, and she pulls it off beautifully. The album has a number of sad slow songs; You’ll Do provides a little breather, and it helps the whole album work better.
Next time out, maybe Harrington will start from the territory of Goodbye Amsterdam, and do an entire album of more modern-sounding songs. Or maybe she will start from You’ll Do, and do an entire album of jazz and blues flavored numbers. Or maybe she will continue to mine the rich vein of traditional-sounding songs heard here. Whatever she chooses, Celilo Falls proves that the results will be well worth hearing.
Rachel Harrington: You‘ll Do
Rachel Harrington: Bury Me Close
Labels: Album Review, New Release, Rachel Harrington
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Discussion in Gaming started by Taters, Oct 17, 2009
Find Your Posts
Taters
Free DLC with purchase
November 3rd release date
Content for Mass Effect 2?
As of right now, i think there's 6 or 7 different campaigns as the different races. saw this on my 360 spotlight, so i decided to check it out, and since its from the creators of Mass Effect, it's going to be visually appealing, and have a hell of a story. only this time, there's going to be about 6 or 7 of them
this might be the best looking once since Oblivion.
I'm sold. MW2 miiiight have to wait a bit till i pop it into the system.
Dragon Age DLC Revealed
New abilities, armor and party members available on launch day.
by Jeff Haynes
October 8, 2009 - It hasn't even come out yet, but Bioware is already hard at work on preparing a ton of downloadable content for players to enjoy, with the first three packs being released on launch day. The first pack, called The Stone Prisoner, adds a new character, the stone golem Shale, who has his own back story and quests, as well as new environments, items and gameplay. Players that purchase a new copy of Dragon Age will receive the Stone Prisoner for free as a download code within retail or digital purchases of the game. It can also be bought separately for fifteen bucks via the PSN and the in-game menu for the PC version, or 1200 points on Xbox Live Marketplace.
The second item is called Warden's Keep, a new adventure that unlocks ancient Grey Warden Armor, a new base and chest to store items, new abilities and additional hours of play. Set within an abandoned fortress that was once a Grey Warden stronghold, the location has long been rumored to be haunted and no one has ever returned from the keep alive. The Warden's Keep pack will cost seven dollars on the PSN and the in-game menu on the PC, or 560 points on the Xbox Live Marketplace. For those players that purchase the Digital Deluxe edition, they will receive Warden's Keep for free. Finally, players will be able to download the Blood Dragon Armor, gear that can be used within Dragon Age as well as Mass Effect 2. Unlike previous news reports, anyone who purchases the original or Collector's Edition of the game will receive a downloadable code for this armor for free.
Dragon Age: Origins is still scheduled to be released on November 3 in North America for the Xbox 360 and PC and November 6 in Europe. The PS3 version will be released later in November.
Taters, Oct 17, 2009
poopyseed
Sounds like they want to take a lot of money off you.
poopyseed, Oct 17, 2009
SiTrik
No online play D:
SiTrik, Oct 17, 2009
SiTrik said: ↑
mass effect didn't have online. in fact, some of the enemies looked like the Geth from Mass Effect. just goes to show that they indeed moved over some content, and just changed it up a bit.
needless to say, i know you don't like the single player stuff like that, but you can always rent it
something as epic looking as this cant be passed up
I'll probably just torrent it.
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Susan Randall, New Executive Director at Pocono Arts Council
Pocono Arts Council’s New Executive Director, Susan Randall
Thank you to the board members at Pocono Arts Council for selecting me to replace the wonderful Laura Goss. I am so excited to continue the good work of Laura and the arts council promoting arts and culture in the Pocono region. I am an East Stroudsburg native who acquired a love of the arts at a very young age at the piano (my teacher was the amazing Wendy Mazer).
I continued to play the piano and clarinet through school and began my college career studying music therapy at Elizabethtown College. I finished my undergraduate degree at Penn State University with a B.S. in Recreation with a concentration in Therapeutic Recreation and have continued to employ some aspect of the arts in every position I’ve held.
For the past 5 ½ years, I worked for the Eastburg Community Alliance at the beautiful historic Dansbury Depot where my role was to be a voice for downtown revitalization. This allowed me to interact with a wide variety of community stakeholders and partners.
One such partnership was with the arts council. Through the PPA project stream grant, we brought art and music into downtown East Stroudsburg with the popular concert series on Monday evenings which allows local artists and musicians to showcase their work. I began to meet and interact with a very passionate Pocono arts community which cemented the idea that the arts are very much alive and well in our area.
My parents instilled in me the value of serving and giving back to the community. My father, W. Jack Wallie, was an inspiration to many in our community and I am striving to continue his legacy. At present, my community involvement includes board positions at the Pocono Cinema and Cultural Center, East Stroudsburg Little League, and membership in the Pocono Mountains Penn State Club, East Stroudsburg’s Shade Tree Commission and East Stroudsburg United Methodist Church.
Although I will now be working “across the bridge,” I live in East Stroudsburg borough with my husband, Steve, daughter Lindsay, and son Lucas. When I’m not out appreciating the arts or shopping local, I can be found with my nose in a book or cheering on the Nittany Lions. Thanks again for the opportunity, and I look forward to meeting many of you in the years to come.
Board President Elizabeth Buzzelli-Clarke, Ed.D. with new Pocono Arts Council Executive Director, Susan Randall
Miharu Lane says
Congratulations Susan! Looking forward to meeting you.
Lisa Diemer says
Congratulations Susan! I look forward to working with you on town projects!
Annette Herlihy says
Congratulations…big shoes to fill but I am sure you will do a great job…
Looking forward to meeting you.
Froilan Kali Ramirez says
Congratulations Susan !!! As a Bushkill Resident / Emerging Artist I look forward to Participating In Future Exhibits at Art Space. Laura will be Missed as She was Very Supportive, I Wish Her All the Best In Her Future Endeavors . I Welcome the Opportunity to Work along with You and Local Artist to Continue to Build Community through My Art.
Roya Fahmy LSW says
I’d like to communicate by email with Director Susan Randall. I’m a drama therapist and psychotherapist who works with creativity to heal clients. I’m very interested in the art and spirituality exhibit.
PoconoArts says
Hi Roya, we’ve just sent you an email. Thanks for your inquiry!
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Sri Chennakesava Temple complex, Belur, Karnataka
“Places all have their own characters, and returning to a city where you have lived before is like coming home to an old friend. But the people begin to look the same; the same faces recurring in cities a thousand miles apart, the same expressions. The flat, hostile stare of the official. The curious look of the peasant. The dull unsurprised faces of the tourists. The same lovers, mothers, beggars, cripples, vendors, joggers, children, policemen, taxi-drivers, pimps. After a while one begins to feel slightly paranoid, as if these people were secretly following from one town to another, changing clothes and faces, but remaining essentially unchanged, going about their dull business with half an eye slightly cocked at us, the intruders. At first one feels a kind of superiority. We are a race apart, we the travellers. We have seen, experienced so much more than they. Content to run out their sad lives in an endless round of sleep-work-sleep, to tend their neat gardens, their identical suburban houses, their small dreams; we hold them in a little contempt. Then, after a while, comes envy. The first time it is almost funny; a sharp sudden sting which subsides nearly straight away. A woman in a park, bending over a child in a pushchair, both faces lit by something which is not the sun. Then comes the second time, the third; two young people on the seafront, arms intertwined; a group of office-girls on their lunchbreak, giggling over coffee and croissants..before long it is an almost constant ache. No, places do not lose their identity, however far one travels. It is the heart which begins to erode after a time.”
– Joanne Harris, “Chocolat”
Poetry in stone - Sri Chennakesava Temple
Blessed with vast verdant, foliage enshrouded plains scattered with moderately-sized gentle hills strewn with staggeringly massive boulders and carpeted by vivid green grass that flamboyantly flaunts its lushness under cover of near-perennial dark, rain-bearing clouds, the township of Belur (also spelled Belooru) in Hassan district of Karnataka, teeming with an unbelievably idyllic laid back life composed of numerous small bazaars and marketplaces sprinkled with hundreds of brilliant hues in the form of fruits and vegetables and sweets for sale and the attires donned by the locals, would have been no different from the thousands of other villages that dot the Indian subcontinent were it not for an evocatively ethereal architectural gem that crowns its meager existence and unquestionably confers upon it an extremely enviable position in the UNESCO List of World Heritage Sites – the highly embellished Vijayanarayana aka Sri Chennakesava Temple (literally translating to “Handsome Long-haired Lord”), commissioned by the Hoysala Dynasty Emperor Bittideva Vishnuvardhana (reign AD 1108-52) in AD 1117 to celebrate the first of his numerous military victories against the Viceroys of the formidable and expansive Chola Dynasty (reigned the Indian states of Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Orissa and the islands of Sri Lanka and Maldives, 300 BC – 1279 AD) of whom he was a vassal, is dedicated to the mythological Lord Keshava/Krishna, an ostentatious playboy-strategist-statesman-cow herder-warrior-philosopher who supposedly lived some 5,000 years ago and is regarded as an incarnation of Lord Vishnu, the Hindu God of life and nourishment. In their literature and folktales, the Hoysalas traced their historic lineage to the Yadava clan of north India which claims genealogical descent from Lord Krishna himself. Despite its unostentatious appearances and near village-like atmosphere, Belur, geographically located on the peaceful banks of the river Yagachi, is not just any other miniscule town next door – though its medieval prestigious impressions are presently indiscernible, it was originally referred to by the name “Velapuri” and was the capital of the Hoysalas, one of the most prominent dynasties of southern India!
Epochal!
After setting eyes on the immaculately magnificent temple seated on its 3-feet high perfectly symmetrical 32-vertexed star-shaped platform (“jagati”) and its numerous exceedingly decorated features, one would not be resorting to hyperbole in stating that the grand structure is literally an epitome of sculptural art – the sheer variety and noteworthy ornamental nature of the artworks and sculptures adorning every conceivable surface of the shrine is unmentionably vast and beyond description – moreover, such is the attention to the minutest of ornamental details that the extraordinarily accomplished artists introduced in their craft that one can be forgiven for believing that the patterns and mythological lores are carved not in stone but in wax or wood! The entire superstructure is composed of dark-green/blue-black hued chloritic schist (soapstone) which is extremely easy to chisel into ornately detailed patterns in its original form but transforms to tremendously resilient, unmalleable stone once exposed to the elements for years. My visit to the colossal temple complex a week back coincided with the sacred occasion of the beginning of the annual ceremonial “Rath Yatra” – an event when temples dedicated to Lord Vishnu all over the country resound with the prayers and devotional chants of hundreds of thousands of devotees – and thus the photos I clicked are crowded with the absolutely incalculable numbers of pilgrims. In fact, the first photo that I have posted here, clicked from near the “Garuda Stambha” located in the courtyard opposite to depict the imposing shrine’s spatial span, is actually a stack of 120 photos which were continuously clicked and later assembled in Photoshop (the latter itself took me over almost four hours!) in order to eliminate the perennial flow of pilgrims and families out for sightseeing!
Stellar - One word, two meanings, spatial and artistic description
The impeccably flawless temple, an exemplar of ancient Dravidian architecture and a testimony to the unequaled skill of the architects and artists who painstakingly toiled for its construction, is surrounded by a vast courtyard flanked at its peripheries by simplistic colonnades also inset with several Kannada inscriptions inscribed in stone and dozens of fascinating sculptures of mythological deities and anthropomorphic entities. The entrance to the enormous complex is via a massive seven-floored pyramidal towering gateway (“Gopuram”), chronologically dated to AD 1397 (reign of the Vijaynagara Empire (ruled AD 1336-1646)), painted sunshine yellow throughout and lined with sculptures of various incarnations and aspects of Lord Vishnu along with fierce servants attending to him and several other mythological deities and mythical creatures. The beyond belief splendid shrine itself is accessible through entrances built along three of its sides, each reached by wide staircases bordered by elegantly sculpted smaller shrines (“Bhumija”) surmounted by pyramidal spires and housing within their small alcoves meticulously detailed stone sculptures of deities so finely polished that they appear to be composed of brass! The incredible magnitude of the innumerable sculptures that are employed in the construction of the gigantic shrine is fantastic – the superstructure’s (and not the platform’s) base itself is composed of three individualistic layers depicting charging elephants, fearsome lions and mounted horses respectively symbolizing insurmountable stability, formidable strength and matchless agility – visually bewilderingly, each of the 600+ beasts is uniquely distinctive from the others in its row!! These are vertically followed in an upward fashion by scroll bands of numerous perceptibly different geometric and floral patterns, smaller inconsequential deities, dancers and temple guards followed in their turn by massive circular or star-shaped pillars supporting in their midst a mesh work of small arched alcoves inset with tens of thousands of crafted deities, celestial dancers and divine devotees.
Sculptural orgasm!
The smaller images give way to larger sculptures, each an exemplar not only of unparalleled sculptural art, but also of excellent ancient mythological fables that even precisely specify how a deity is to be visually depicted and which weapon and which facial expression and bodily movement symbolically represents what action and which boon-bestowing capability! On the walls are carved massive sculptures of numerous Hindu deities in their numerous different incarnations, most prominent being Lord Vishnu, the God of life and nourishment, and Lord Shiva, the God of death and destruction – thus there is the anthropomorphic, boar-faced mighty Varaha lifting the Earth Goddess Bhudevi from the sea of ether after defeating the demons who had imprisoned her; the terribly fierce and unimaginably powerful semi-lion, semi-human Narasimha furiously tearing apart the body of the demon Hiranyakashyipu; the benevolent, boon-bestowing, omniscient aspect of Lord Vishnu flanked on either side by his wives Bhudevi and Lakshmi, the Goddess of wealth and prosperity; the winged, muscular, multi-armed falcon-faced bird deity Garuda; the ten-faced, twenty-armed intellectual demon King Ravana of Lanka attempting to physically lift the massive Kailasha mountain, the abode of Lord Shiva; the supremely gifted archer-warlord Arjuna; the ten-armed Goddess Durga, a fierce manifestation of primordial feminine energy, piercing the body of buffalo-demon Mahishasura with her intimidatingly long trident; and a representation of Lord Shiva furnishing his terrific trident and celestial drum and indulging in “Tandava” (the destructive dance of universal obliteration). My personal favorite remains “Gajasurasamhara”/“Gajacharmambaradhari” – a sixteen-armed combative Lord Shiva wielding numerous weapons of death and devastation while dancing blissfully upon the decapitated head of the slain elephant-demon Gajasura whose flayed hide he triumphantly raises and brandishes as an enormous cloak while his family and followers gaze wide-eyed terrified and deferential.
"Gajasurasamhara" - The ecstasy of a triumphant God
But the vivid blossoming of poetry in stone does not cease here – punctuating the rows of deities and their attendant guards and followers are exceedingly skillfully finished floral scrolls, exquisite friezes and intricately perforated stone latticework screens which convolute and twist into a sculptural rococo depicting entire tales from ancient Hindu epics like the Mahabharata, Ramayana and the various Puranas. And then there are the unmistakable graceful emblems of Hoysala Dynasty – a young man battling a huge aggressive lion (some say a tiger) either with his bare hands or with a sharp-edged sword. Legend goes that the dynasty’s mythical progenitor, Sala, was indulging in ritualistic ceremonies with his Jain monk Guru Sudatta Muni when a fierce lion (or tiger) pounced upon them prompting the terrified mendicant to pronounce “Hoy, Sala!” (“Strike, Sala!”) and later, following the gruesome battle and the slaying of the lion (or tiger), blessing the courageous disciple with vast territorial sovereignty that would soon flourish. Contemporaneous historical accounts note that Hoysala Dynasty sovereigns preceding Vishnuvardhana were followers of Jainism and he was the first to convert to Vaishnav Hinduism under the influence of the 12th-century Tamil Vedanta saint Acharya Sri Ramanuja and soon thereafter, considering his military victories to be benedictions from Gods, conceived and commissioned this splendid temple complex. Most architectural historians and wildlife experts however doubt that lions ever existed in this part of the country and that might explain the ill-conceived stone figurines that mark Hoysala temple complexes for they might have been envisioned by the otherwise superiorly talented artists on the features of tigers that are still abundant here. Other historians also point out that this mythical tale and its sculptural depiction gained credence following Vishnuvardhana’s vanquishing of the Chola armies from his territories and the lion in the sculptures is probably symbolically representative of the Chola insignia.
"Hoy, Sala!"
The massive panels that grace the three entrances of the temple, besides being flanked by exceptionally realistic celestial guards, transform along the doorjambs into tremendously well-conceived mythological scenes composed of an array of mythical creatures and incarnations and celestial followers of Lord Vishnu – thus there is an incarnation each on each door – Lord Vishnu himself on one, Lord Narasimha on the second and Lord Varaha on the third – with an assortment of heavenly followers and musicians, altogether mounted on a cavernous platform sheltered within the vicious jaws of a “Kirtimukha” (the ferociously wide fanged, lion-like face of an all-consuming demon conceived and originated out of thin air by Lord Shiva to destroy other, mightier demons) and supported upon the mighty wings of a Garuda preparing to fly off – lastly the entire scene emerges from within wave-like flourishes eventually culminating in an elephantine mythical “Makara” (entities possessing the body of a fish, the face and tusks of an elephant, the limbs of a lion and the tail of a peacock) on either side of the lintel. Immediately below each of these fascinatingly vast visual compositions is observable the simplistic portrayal of “Gajalakshmi” – Goddess Lakshmi being showered with milk and honey by huge elephants.
Exquisiteness!
But the most adored and acclaimed sculptures that adorn the temple’s superstructure are the voluptuous, finely proportioned celestial damsels crafted to perfection and surmounted on brackets crowning 38 of the pillars that support the substantial roof of the shrine – referred to as “Madanika” or “Salabhanjika” (literally translating to “breaking a Sala tree (Shorea robusta) branch” – the reference to the legendary Sala is coincidental), the heavenly maidens, each attired in fine thin draperies that barely cover their large breasts and hips, adorned with jewels and ornaments and surrounded by followers and highly intricate foliage and often unusual creatures such as lizards arching to capture flies, depict either feminine mythological divinities such as the beautiful Goddess Natya Mohini (a delicate incarnation of Lord Vishnu postured dancing with a hand on her head – drawing from the tale where she entreated the demon Bhasmasura, who was bestowed with the boon to reduce to ashes every living entity he touched, into touching his own forehead after flirting with and prompting him to dance as she did), or tremendously animated seductive dancers, musicians, huntresses or simply pretty maidens illustrated adoring themselves in mirrors (“Darpana Sundari”), rinsing their hair with water, conversing with their pet parrots (“Shukabhashini”) or even being harassed by monkeys! Most historians concede that the outstanding, ethereally beautiful maidens were inspired by King Vishuvardhana’s wife Shantala Devi who, although professing to Jain faith despite her husband’s conversion, did have constructed within the temple complex’s peripheries a smaller side-shrine also dedicated to Sri Chennakesava and christened as “Kappe Chennigaraya temple” (more on that later). The photo posted here is that of the "Shikarika" (“Huntress”) and besides the extraordinarily vivid detailing of her own being, one can also notice and be awed by the thought process that went into fashioning the superlative nature of the two small sculptures adjacent that respectively portray her with a prey (resembling a dragon!) slung over her shoulder and being helped by a servile maid in plucking a thorn that had got embedded in her foot.
"Shikarika" - The celestial huntress
Similar sculptures exist inside the shrine as well, however, owing to the occasion of the advent of the Rath Yatra, the explicably crowded dark interiors unbelievably stuffed to the seams with devotees repetitively loudly chanting “Govinda, Govinda” (one of the names of Lord Krishna) rendered photography impossible. That the massive sanctum is even more exquisitely ornamented than its exteriors can be gauged from the fact that the patterned pillars here are so painstakingly chiseled and polished to achieve such a remarkable degree of shimmer that several historians and writers mistakenly regard them as being lathe-turned (that is, they weren't sculpted by hand, but the roughly crafted pillar was mounted on a wheel and rotated so that its edges sweeped against a fixed blade/chisel that smoothly shaped its surface). Garlands of fragrant red and yellow flowers adorned the doorjambs and the sculptures and glittering glimmering tinsel stretched from the edges of the shrine to conceive a bejeweled canopy sparkling in the rays of the minutest of streaks of sunlight that escaped the cloudy atmosphere and the exhaustive stone lattice screens only to be caught in the spider web of tinsel. The handsome 6-feet tall sculpture of Lord Chennakesava, attired with silver ornaments and colorful garments, appeared translucently otherworldly while the thoroughly crowded darkness around the sanctum dissolved into whiffs of color and noise as hundreds of devotees pushed and strived to appear in front of the Lord and present to him their aspirations for worldly prosperity and heavenly redemption. Within a glass case adjacent the central shrine rest two considerably massive sandals that are said to belong to the Lord and are worn by him every night when he departs to frolic with his friends and damsels – belief is that a pair of these hallowed sandals disappears each night and the local cobblers reverentially prepare one for consecration every morning and present it to the shrine without fail – to every 21st-century youngster’s delight, the practice of chilling and freaking out with buddies every night thus finds reverberance in the most ancient of our religious and literary traditions as well! The most acclaimed of the numerous ornate pillars that line the sanctum is the exquisite Narasimha pillar that could originally even rotate around on its ball bearing and still prominently flashes the unadorned space on its surface which the sculptors intentionally left blank as an open challenge to any contemporaneous or later craftsmen to engrave and display an artistic flair as resplendent as theirs – that it still remains blank does wordlessly declare something about the consummate skills of the Hoysalas!
Bewilderingly detailed! - King Vishnuvardhana's court
Hindu mythology states that time nearly came to a halt while Lord Krishna recounted the ancient knowledge embodied in the epic scripture Sri Bhagavadgita to the archer-warlord Arjuna in the middle of the battlefield of Kurukshetra during the ruthlessly gory 18-day Mahabharata war. Islamic mythology too states that while the blessed Prophet Muhammad ascended the stairs of heaven to reach Allah’s throne, he spent a lifetime in each of the seven heavens and yet returned before the sweat that he had wiped off his face on the stairs of the first heaven could fall to the ground underneath. Gazing at the unparalleled sculptures embossed on the exterior walls of the shrine, one can literally believe that time is slowing down to a near-halt and the images are beckoning the visitors and coming alive to recount the numerous stories they carry in their stone bosoms, while the tales thus told are themselves merging into each other to portray an entire universe of deities, demon lords, mythical creatures and mighty anthropomorphic warlords. The multitudes of sculptures and scroll work lend testimony to the incomparable skill of the architects and artists who were themselves so impressed and overjoyed by their own creations that they disregarded ancient Hindu architectural customs that prohibit artists and sculptors from signing their work – thus come to light the names, sovereign-bestowed titles and places of origin, but not the achievements and lives, of Ruvari Mallitamma, Malliyanna, Kenchamalliyanna, Malla, Eechana, Chikkahampa, Nagoja, Malloja, Dasoja and his son Javana. The exquisite artworks and the years of toil that must have gone into their execution also give credence to the unforeseen span of time – nearly 103 years – involved in the shrine’s completion – it was eventually consecrated during the reign of Vishnuvardhana’s grandson Veer Ballala II (reign AD 1173-1220).
Divinity framed - Lord Vishnu, the God of life and nourishment
Back in the colossal courtyard, the enormous, 42-feet tall “Deepa Stambha” (“Pillar of Lights”) erected on another considerably smaller star-shaped pedestal is a scientific wonder in itself – a gravity pillar balanced only by its own weight, it touches the pedestal at merely three pinprick points and sheets of paper and cloth can be passed uninterruptedly from one end to another underneath its stone enormity!
The colonnades comprising the enclosing walls of the temple complex bear Kannada inscriptions mentioning the construction of the shrine, later additions commissioned by the sovereigns of several succeeding dynasties, the artists and sculptors involved in the building and ornamentation and also several of the battles and religious conversions that took place in medieval Karnataka. Dozens of sculptures embedded within the walls of the colonnade are arranged in patterns pertaining to the deity they represent or the mythological tales they portray – what is fascinating is that in several of these sculptures, the deities invoked, thoroughly embellished with weaponry and lavish ornaments, bear what appears to be corn cobs! Historians state that corn first appeared in India in late 16th-century accompanying the advent of Portuguese seafaring merchants – then what is it doing in statues and idols envisioned and constructed over 400 years before that?! Worth pondering over.
Stone sentinels
A corner of the courtyard is dedicated to the “Vasudeva Sarovar”, a large rectangular stepped water tank (“Kalyani/Pushkarni”) filled with murky dark green water and flanked on the sides with small shrines surmounted by pyramidal spires nearly identical to the ones that exist along the main temple’s staircases – it is said that the central shrine too was originally crowned with a vertically massive tapering pinnacle which was however over the years lost to the vagaries of time and nature – to my untrained eyes at least, the shrine, in its present form, appears so considerably unique and unusually interesting when juxtaposed against the rest of the architecturally identical Dravidian temples. The restoration and conservation efforts undertaken by the Karnataka division of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) are undeniably commendable and need be emulated throughout the vast country – it is heartening to note that the usual excuses, such as a shortage of funds and experienced manpower, so often advanced by the ASI to explain its lackadaisical attitude, did not become an obstacle in preserving this bewilderingly superlative architectural exemplar for future generations.
In the corner opposite the Kalyani on the far side of the gigantic rectangular complex sits a relatively moderately-proportioned and less densely adorned shrine referred to as “Ranganayaki Temple” and dedicated to the poetess-saint Kodhai Devi Andal of Srivalliputtur (Tamil Nadu) – said to have been raised from the remains of several earlier, individual temples, the shrine, surmounted by an assortment of crown-like domes possessing pointed finials vertically protruding from them, boasts of a large raised courtyard supported upon highly symmetrical, flawlessly chiseled pillars. The walls bear friezes and sculptures that actually look as if they have been drawn from other geographic sources and embedded herein like stickers on a child’s notebook to render it more attractive without necessarily dispelling the overall appearance of a cutout, a jigsaw conceived from numerous unmatched, unassociated fragments.
Stitched together - The Ranganayaki Temple
Besides friezes of tiny mounted elephants bedecked with jewelry running along the base of the Ranganayaki shrine’s exterior walls, several deities including Lord Shiva, Lord Vishnu, Goddess Durga, Goddess Lakshmi and Lord Varaha too have been portrayed on the walls – the sculptures here too have been signed by their originators, most prominent of them being Bechama and Madhuvanna. Mesmerizingly, as verifiable from the photos that I clicked of the shrine’s stone jewels, none of the foliage and line-pattern canopies that surround the divine figurines are identical! This unquestionably goes on to corroborate the unquestionably noteworthy sculptural proficiency demonstrated by the artist-craftsmen of medieval India.
Separated from the Ranganayaki shrine by an enthrallingly ornate but relatively simplistic subsidiary shrine (“Soumyanayaki Temple”) which had been on that particular day temporarily fitted with large television screens and recording instruments to broadcast the proceedings of the religious ceremonies under progress in the central shrine to news channels, exists the squat Veera Narayana temple that is contemporaneous of Sri Chennakesava temple and is similarly wreathed with sculptures of deities, celestial damsels and mythological battle scenes – my favorite is the one depicting a physical combat between a massive mounted and caparisoned elephant and the extraordinarily strong Pandava prince Bhima from Mahabharata who is said to have been mighty enough to devastate several armies in a single day of warfare and fling elephants away like toy figurines.
Destruction personified - Prince Bhima
Adjacent the Veera Narayana temple is the aforementioned Kappe Chennigaraya temple – according to an inscription engraved within its sanctum, this smaller shrine, one of the most prominent exemplars of Hoysala architecture and internally spatially almost a smaller replica of the interiors of Sri Chennakesava temple, was commissioned by Queen Shantala Devi. The sanctum boasts of two adjacent shrines, dedicated to Lord Vishnu and his consort Soumyanayaki, slightly offset from each other and each accessed via inspiringly ornate entrances possessing proficiently carved doorjambs and lintels not very different from those leading within Sri Chennakesava temple; the pillars too boast of brackets supported on the shoulders of divinities and inset with beautiful dancing Shilabalikas only slightly less competently sculpted than those of Sri Chennakesava temple. The nomenclature of the shrine is said to have its origins in an exciting medieval legend (not resonated by literary and historical records) concerning the beyond belief interesting tale behind the shrine’s consecration – it is said that the master craftsman Amarashilpi Jakanachari who hailed from the village of Kaidala was enviably entrusted with the sculptural creation of the exceptional 6.5-feet tall, profusely ornamented representation of the deity that was to grace the central shrine, but for years he became so engrossed in the arduous task assigned to him that he forgot all about his family and children, thereby prompting his eldest son Dankachari to journey from the village to Belur to confront his wayward father.
Straightforward symmetry - The Kappe Chennigaraya Temple
However Jakanachari refused to identify or even acknowledge his son's presence and as a last resort the boy, himself an outstanding sculptor, publicly challenged his father that he can identify flaws in the divine idol he was constructing. Enraged, Jakanachari pledged to saw off his own hands if any imperfections were determined. Sandalwood paste was applied to the massive idol and it dried everywhere except in the navel area where a frog was found nesting in a small cavity – as proclaimed, Jakanachari did cut his own hands and the defective idol was relocated to the subsidiary shrine sanctified as “Kappe Channigaraya”, “Kappe” being “frog” in Kannada. The tale of course does not end immediately at this point but juxtaposes on a happier ending where Jakanachari is commanded by the Lord himself to return to his family and construct a similar idol in his village following the completion of which his hands will be restored to him – of course, like all oral folk lore, this one too does not explain how Jakanachari sculpted the second idol without his arms!
The allure of the magnificence of Sri Chennakesava Temple drew me from hundreds of kilometers away and the gracefulness of its unsurpassably delicate sculptures and commendable architectural highlights literally prove to be irresistible amongst all the monuments and shrines I have come across so far in my sojourns – in fact, although the temple not at all condescendingly allows the famed Akshardham of Delhi and the numerous splendid ISKCONs scattered all over the country to garner in the reputation and renown (refer Pixelated Memories - Akshardham Temple, Delhi and Pixelated Memories - ISKCON Temple, Delhi), it stylishly proves to be far grander than all of them combined and lives up to its promise of being an overwhelming site of tranquil solace and reverence, both visual and spiritual – the Hoysalas must be contentedly looking at it and experiencing unadulterated pride in the fact that even though their dynasty never survived, the little architectural jewel they embedded in their erstwhile capital has blossomed and garners tourists, spiritualty seekers and travelers from all over the globe.
Colossal!
How glorious it would have been to read about these architectural marvels in school textbooks that indisputably almost always glorify north Indian kingdoms, histories and edifices – one would be surprised to note that the Sultanate of Delhi that built the towering Qutb Minar, another World Heritage Site, was still almost a century away from coming into being and the dynasty that conceived and constructed the ethereal Taj Mahal, one of the Seven Wonders of the World, was still over 400 years away when this imposing shrine was raised. But unbelievably, it is said that the other major temple that the Hoysalas commissioned in their other twin capital Halebidu (Dwarasamudra) incredibly even surpasses this one in terms of sculptural artwork and ornamentation! Off I go again with the wind to locate the tales engraved in stone!
Here myths come alive!
Location: About 500 meters from Belur Bus stop, Hassan district
Open: The temple complex remains open every day from 7 am – 6 pm for people of all faiths, belief systems and genders. The sanctum is closed from 10-11 am, 1-3 pm and 5-5.30 pm.
How to reach: Hassan is accessible from different parts of Karnataka by regular KSRTC bus and Indian Railways train services. It is approximately 180 kilometers or five hours away by road from Bangalore. From Hassan, Belur is located about 42 kilometers or roughly one hour away by bus at the end of a journey that does take one on certain thoroughly pockmarked stretches of road winding through hill-flanked barren plains and fields. Regular buses ply between Hassan and Belur throughout the day.
Remarks – Footwear is not allowed inside the temple complex and shoes can be left at the counter near the entrance and retrieved afterwards following the payment of a modest sum (usually Rs 10 for two pairs of footwear).
Econ.ohio-state.edu - Maize in Pre-Columbian India
Gops.org - Face to face with history :: Belur & Halebid
Karnatakatravelogue.blogspot.in - Interiors of Chennakeshava temple, Belur
Rcmysore-portal.kar.nic.in - History of Sri Chennakeshava Temple
Wikipedia.org - Hoysala Empire
Wikipedia.org - Chennakesava Temple
Posted by Pixelated Memories at 6:12 pm 3 comments:
Labels: Architecture, Belur, Chennakesava Temple, Gajasurasamhara, Hassan, Hinduism, History, Hoysala Dynasty, Kappe Chennigaraya, Karnataka, Maize in India, Photography, Ranganayaki, Sculpture, Shilabalika, Vishnuvardhana
Seringapatam, Mandya, Karnataka
“The reasons why Tipu was reviled are not far to seek. Englishmen were prejudiced against him because they regarded him as their most formidable rival and an inveterate enemy, and because, unlike other Indian rulers, he refused to become a tributary of the English Company. Many of the atrocities of which he has been accused were allegedly fabricated either by persons embittered and angry on account of the defeats which they had sustained at his hands, or by the prisoners of war who had suffered punishments which they thought they did not deserve. He was also misrepresented by those who were anxious to justify the wars of aggression which the Company's Government had waged against him. Moreover, his achievements were deliberately belittled and his character blackened in order that the people of Mysore might forget him and rally round the (Wadiyar) Raja, thus helping in the consolidation of the new regime”
– Mohibbul Hasan, “The History of Tipu Sultan” (1971)
"Welcome to the Historical City of Srirangapatna" - The Delhi Gate
On the 4th of May 1799, in the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War fought at Seringapatam (aka Srirangapatnam), fell Badshah Nasib-ud-Daula Fath Ali Khan Tipu Sultan, the legendary “Tiger of Mysore” and the foremost of Indian Sultans who perennially and ferociously opposed the rapacious acquisitive and revenue policies of British East India “trading” Company, and so fierce was the terror he instilled in the hearts of his enemies and the respect he commanded even from them that the British officers who took part in the siege of his fortress were grudgingly compelled to commission a small square, grass-enshrouded garden and within it install a sober, evocative stone memorial indicating the hallowed spot where the formidable Sultan was killed in battle. Symbolically portraying the vanquishing of Tipu’s forces by depicting a British lion trampling upon a tiger, a commemorative medal was also issued by the Company’s Army to be awarded to all officers and soldiers who participated in the battle against the Sultan. His legacy survives in a series of disjointed monuments and relics from his majestic fortress-citadel scattered throughout the capital city Seringapatam which has since become thoroughly overpopulated and come to occupy almost every portion of the grand fortress thereby turning it into a mere indifferent suburb of the beautiful city of Mysore, the erstwhile exclusive capital of the Wadiyar Dynasty (ruled AD 1399-1947) whom the fearless Tipu unceremoniously deposed from power for a short interregnum – thus while modern-day Seringapatam, consisting of brilliantly multihued block-like houses and apartment buildings with very little to offer in the name of historicity or architectural/artistic heritage, seems lost to the vagaries of human forgetfulness and urbanization, the few edifices that Tipu had designed and constructed, with their identical vibrant orange hues, rise like they were intended to as majestic beacons in a city now shorn of all its grandeur, ferocity and regal presence.
Commemorative - Here breathed his last the legendary "Tiger of Mysore"
Once more for the sake of recounting in a few words the courageous Sultan’s extraordinary history, I replicate the text from one of my earlier articles –
"An innovative genius and unparalleled military tactician who also possessed intimate knowledge of Islamic jurisprudence, shooting, horse-riding, Hindi-Urdu writing, poetry and economic systems, Badshah Fath Ali Khan Bahadur Tipu Sultan was instructed in military tactics by French officers in service of his father Nawab Hyder Ali Khan and is credited with creating the first prototype rockets which he used in wars against the annexing armies of British East India “trading” Company whom he continued to oppose and fiercely resist all his short life. Technologically advanced and financially capable, he employed several skilled European weapon makers and mercenaries, was aware of the potent warfare technologies of his time, possessed an extremely strong naval force consisting of numerous war ships and frigates and even went to the extent of suggesting an alliance based on mutual admiration with Napoleon Bonaparte who came as far as Egypt on a conquering spree to unite their forces.. Despite his superb administrative, organizational and warfare capabilities, Tipu is considered (based on unreliable, highly biased early British sources who participated in wars against him) a fanatic bigoted Muslim and an extremely harsh, iconoclast ruler who heinously ordered destruction of numerous temples and shrines and oversaw the forceful conversion or merciless execution of hundreds of non-Muslims, especially Christians, besides following a “scorched earth” policy and pitilessly ravaging and impoverishing captured territories and destroying their economies and agrarian capabilities. His admirers continue to debate that he looked after his subjects irrespective of their religion and personal beliefs, employed Hindus at almost each of the influential court post and provided religious grants and protection against brigands to several Hindu temples, some of which existed in the immediate vicinity of his palace. Yet he remains a much abhorred and very controversial personality in Indian history – a patriot who relentlessly strived against foreign colonial rule, yet himself a foreigner who ruthlessly oppressed his subjects and executed those he considered unbelievers or heretics."
(Read the full post here – Pixelated Memories - Tipu Sultan Shahi Mosque)
Dark clouds, dark tidings? - One of Tipu's numerous powder magazines
Though the fortified city is located upon the flood plains of an ethereally beautiful, densely forested island within the Kaveri river in the district of Mandya, its association, both historic, legendary and geographic with the district of Mysore, has obliged many to seek its administrative unification with the latter from which it is located a mere 15 kilometers apart – presently however, it is accessible via the Mysore-Bangalore highway through a narrow, unimpressive branching road passing through the imposing, triple-storied “Delhi Gate” (also often referred to as “Bangalore Gate”), which though now miserably ruined and hideously layered with movie posters and election sloganeering (so much for the political correctness associated with the city and its inspiring history!), once formed the royal thoroughfare over which would have passed the authoritative Sultan regally seated on his elephant and escorted by his handsome cavalry and powerful royal guards. The idyllic, laidback life of the city spontaneously engulfs one as soon as one steps through the gateway and the vast beautiful green fields, glistening with crops and punctuating the line of low-lying residential quarters and remains of ruined palaces and cities crying for attention and conservation, seem like a disappointment against the enormous expectations of observing the splendor of the Sultan’s citadel. For someone from Delhi, used to seeing massive fortresses with towering walls, massive palatial complexes and serrated battlements equipped for defense, Seringapatam, with its fragmented structures, insignificant gateways, ruined palaces and decrepit incoherent defenses, along with the modern-day boxed-in settlements that have become rooted within its peripheries, all ensconced cheek-by-jowl within the fortress’ diminutive (just barely out of reach of an energetic lithe goat!) and thick enclosing walls seems out of place with the flamboyant tales of its erstwhile inhabitants’ martial prowess and battle capabilities.
Celestial - The sluggish waters of river Kaveri
But then of course, the root cause of this desolation is not far from the surface – the repetitive unrelenting attacks by the combined forces of British East India Company, the Marathas of Maharashtra and the Nizam of Hyderabad had very nearly reduced the defenses to rubble; what remained was razed and destroyed by the victorious British, unrepentant and avaricious in their retribution against the fallen Tiger’s territories and possessions; post-independence governments were not very different and unquestionably, one might even say eagerly, gave way to the combined ravenous forces of urbanization and commercialization and failed miserably to safeguard the historic nature of the sites involved against encroachments and vandalism – point in case, Tipu’s residential Lal Mahal (“Red Palace”) that was said to be a simplistic affair externally but possessed several magnificent buildings and colonnades within, the remains of which subdued to mere stubs and boundary walls between 1807-09 on orders of Colonel Arthur Wellesley (later H.H. Lord The Duke of Wellington) to supply building material for the Wadiyar Maharaja’s palace in Mysore (refer Pixelated Memories - Mysore Palace), exist in close vicinity to the Delhi Gate and were unlawfully dug up by the local population once again a few decades ago when excavations revealed the presence of expensive gold and pearl articles – the government’s sole response, not unexpected, was to seal off the entire premises with strong iron railings and cease visitor entry in its entirety, notwithstanding the visitor’s credentials and/or intentions with regards observing the ruins. About the palace contemporary accounts note –
“a kind of colonnade painted green with red ornamental work, forming what is called the tiger stripe…Round the arched compartments of the roof, or ceiling, are disposed a variety of Arabic and Persian verses, applicable to the signs of the Zodiac, and importing the godlike superiority of the Sultan in his princely character.”
History dictates that it was this palace where British officials accepted the surrender of two of Tipu’s sons following the imposition of punitive terms of treaty upon his defeat in the Third Anglo-Mysore War (First Battle of Seringapatam, 1792) and it was here eventually that his body was brought for preparation for burial upon his demise. But then, when have monuments and heritage structures ever been accorded their due dignity in this country?
Soaring - The painstakingly ornamented Masjid-i-Ala
Couple of meters from the Delhi Gate is located Tipu’s still functional Jama Masjid, the royal Friday congregational mosque, one of the most prominent edifices in Seringapatam – built in 1782-84 upon the Sultan’s ascension to the throne and christened “Masjid-i-Ala” (“Mosque of the Ruler”), the mosque is a grand double-storied structure flanked on its two front corners by enormous, exquisitely ornamented octagonal minarets sculpted throughout with tiny decorative alcoves, realistic pine cone-like outbursts, slender embellished turrets, rectangular pigeon holes, highly-stylized leaf motifs and floral and geometric patterns. The unsurpassably beautiful yet humble prayer chamber situated on the first floor, painted a subdued pink-white that drastically contrasts against the brilliant saffron-orange of the rest of the structure, is adorned with a rococo of plasterwork designs, ornamental cusped arches, concave domed roofs transforming into massive stucco explosions of floral arrangements and calligraphy inscriptions pertaining to the 99 names of Allah. It possesses a colonnade against its front facade that is supported on unusually simplistically chiseled pillars and bear once more the ubiquitous lavishness of embellishments – decorative floral motifs, fascinating pilasters (fake, thin pillars) ornamented with densely detailed floral medallions supported on thin, equally well-described stalks and unbelievably beautiful cusped arches – that seem to have been a landmark of all buildings that Tipu conceived and commissioned. The ground floor boasts of shaded passageways accessible by arched entrances flanked by an overabundance of miniaturized alcoves which might have once been used to house earthen oil lamps to endow the entire building with an unearthly trance glow; a moderately-sized courtyard inset with a deep rectangular water tank along one corner and punctuated along its sides by finely plastered over graves (undeniably well-kept and also painted in the all-encompassing bright orange) exists around the mosque building – sadly however, the limited expanse of space envisioned within the mosque’s enclosing walls render photographing its enormity in its entirety inconceivable and one is denied the possibility of photographing both the floors, the expansiveness of the handsome minaret towers and the geographic spatial expanse of the structure in a single click – stepping back and clicking from afar is equally fruitless since now even though the minarets can be well-framed, the lower floors very nearly disappear behind the residential settlements that have mushroomed around the structure and the low buttresses of wilderness-covered rock that project from the ground in its near vicinity.
The physiognomy of a Sultan's mosque
Outside the mosque, we hired a local guide who promised to show us around the colossal fortress complex’s remains within three hours in his auto-rickshaw for a negotiable sum of Rs 300 depending on whether or not we liked his services and command over his beloved city’s history – admiringly, we ended up paying him Rs 350 following the passage of the whirlwind tour via which we explored almost every monument that the historic township has to offer and grudgingly conceded that dust covered, sweat drenched and tired, we would have been roaming the indiscernible streets were it not for the polite and talkative guide and his swift auto-rickshaw. The wide street immediately opposite the mosque, flanked on both sides by wilderness and small rock faces abutting from earth, leads first to the aforementioned memorialized spot where Tipu, who styled himself “Asad Allah ul-Ghalib” (“The Conquering Lion of God”), was killed fighting and his body was found at the conclusion of the day’s battle (he was supposedly killed by a British soldier who failed to recognize him but thrusted his sword through him nonetheless after being spellbound by his expensive robe and jewel-studded ornaments!), and eventually to the wretchedly ruined, tree and foliage reclaimed, “Water Gate”, one of the fortress’ secret gateways that were accessible to only a select few for swiftly reaching the Kaveri riverfront – upon the commencement of battle, it was through a significant breach adjacent this gateway which the Sultan, betrayed by his own minister Mir Sadiq, was trying to have mended that the British soldiers poured in the fortress to mercilessly annihilate over 10,000 of the brave soldiers of Mysore and cause the ensuing proceedings that in hindsight cannot but be regarded as a singularly landmark event in the subcontinent’s colonial history. Noted the Urdu poet-politician Allamah Muhammad Iqbal –
“Jafar az Bengal va Sadiq az Deccan,
Nang-e-Adam, Nang-e-Deen, Nang-e-Watan”
(“Mir Jafar of Bengal and Mir Sadiq of Deccan are a disgrace to all mankind, their religion and their country.”)
Ruined!
A massive, gnarled Banyan tree grows next to the gate and vermillion-drenched stone sculptures placed within the hollows of its thick roots provide testimony to the worship of serpent deities (“Naga”) considered capable of bestowing fertility and child birth. Notwithstanding the gateway’s crumbling and abandoned condition with its walls tumbling down along its sides and its plasterwork peeling away to reveal the brick and stone layers underneath, an Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) green board appears next to it, ironically and perhaps with a touch of sarcasm, declaring it a “Protected Ancient Monument”.
The city was christened after Sri Ranganatha, a manifestation of Lord Vishnu, the Hindu God of life and nourishment, who is still worshipped in a gigantic Dravidian temple complex in the heart of the fortress which Tipu, despite his oft-quoted barbaric iconoclastic character, not only allowed to uninterruptedly survive but also patronized. The bewilderingly majestic temple complex, an eye-opening epitome of medieval Hindu temple architecture that grandly endures throughout south India, is dated to have been commissioned in AD 984 by Tirumalaiah, a local vassal of the Ganga Dynasty (reign AD 350-1000), and was expanded and ornamented with additional features and sculptures by Emperors belonging to the Hoysala Dynasty (reign AD 1026-1343), Vijaynagara Kingdom (reign AD 1336-1646) and the Wadiyars/Wodeyars. Presently classified as a monument of immense national importance and a well-renowned Hindu pilgrimage site, the temple complex, surmounted by a lofty layered pyramidal tower sculpted with representations of deities and religious iconography, is accessible through a soaring “Gopuram” (pyramidal entrance gateway), the only feature that we witnessed (and photographed) given that the exceedingly long slithering queues of devotees lining up for offering devotions (and worries) to the deity would have claimed over an hour and a half to negotiate! Such is the belief that people, not just from the surrounding localities but from all over southern India, have in the deity whom they know as “Adi Rangaswamy” (literally, “the First Lord Ranga”) since the temple is the first of the five dedicated to Sri Ranganathaswamy located upon the meandering banks of the sacred river Kaveri.
Immensity visualized - The ancient shrine of Sri Ranganathswamy
The river can be spotted in all its illustriousness by following a narrow dusty path towards the right side of the temple gateway that couple of hundred meters later leads straightaway to a sharp cliff face veiled by numerous jackfruit trees weighed down further by extremely large (and unsettling!) beehives. The river bargains its way across rocky banks teeming with lush foliage and a superficial absence of all wildlife (although it is swarming with crocodiles) and overlooking it are some of Tipu’s orange-sopping armories, arsenals, powder magazines (one of which is said to have blown itself during one of the Battles of Seringapatam thereby rendering offense unviable along this face of the fortress) and a featureless white dungeon redolent of death and torture which the ferocious Sultan employed on numerous occasions with mind-numbing impunity to chastise his prisoners, especially captured British commanders and generals. For some indiscernible reason of its own understanding, ASI has christened the dreadful dungeon as “Bailey’s Prison” after Colonel Bailey who perished here as a consequence of his wounds and the ill-treatment forced upon him as a captive in the penitentiary. Bailey had commanded the British forces against the might of Mysore under Hyder Ali (reign AD 1772-82) in the Second Anglo-Mysore War (Battle of Pollilur, 1780) in which the former were crushingly defeated following the explosion of their gunpowder tumbrils upon being set afire by a bombardment of Tipu’s highly effective incendiary rockets. That the British took lessons from the defeat and soon thereafter adopted highly-sophisticated and lethal rocket technology in their military arsenal reminds one of the following lines from the book “Can You Hear the Nightbird Call?” by Anita Rau Badami –
“(Bibi-ji) had a sneaking admiration for these fair-skinned people who had infiltrated every part of the world with their manners and customs and languages, who had managed to make even a refrigerator of a country like Canada a place of comfort and plenty. Unlike the Panjauri villagers who assigned everything to Fate, the goras, Bibi-ji noticed with admiration, wanted to know why and what and when. It was not boats or horses that had transported them to all corners of the world, but their long noses, which quivered with a desire to poke into everything. Their sky-colored eyes watered with the need to peer under every stone, their white fingers itched to take everything apart until they understood it, learnt how it worked, found what they needed to make their own lives better.”
Haunted? Terrifying at least! - Tipu's dungeons
The punitive structure, comprising of a series of long, low-roofed vaulted cells supported upon thick pillars and bearing resilient stone rings through which were bound the chains shackling the inmates, possesses minimalistic openings in the center of the roof to allow sunlight and air to filter through and is located on a considerably lower terrain, a sort of dugout that vindictively exposes it to the elements, than its immediate surroundings. Conjecture is that the prisoners were chained facing the wall so as to torturously remain standing upright throughout their captivity and were forced to eat disgracefully like horses off the stone ledges protruding from the further walls.
The penultimate landmark we visited in the fortified city was the graceful summer residence “Daria Daulat Bagh” (“The Sea of Wealth Garden”) of Tipu Sultan, conceived and constructed in AD 1784 – set within a large Persian-style “Charbagh” garden (whereby a larger compound is divided into smaller squares by means of tree-lined walkways, ornamental water channels and fountains), the teakwood-built square residence seated upon a high stone platform is surrounded by wide colonnades and supported on numerous arches open to wind from all four directions with every conceivable surface of its exterior walls, prominent protruding windows (“jharokhas”) and roof extravagantly gilded and mesmerizingly painted into numerous vibrant, multihued panels depicting stylized motifs, vases possessing evocative and realistic flowers and foliage, and huge frescoes portraying elaborate battle scenes and regal processions including the aforementioned ignonimous defeat of the British Army at the Battle of Pollilur.
Deterioration - Daria Daulat Palace
Photography is sadly prohibited within the building and it is really, really tiresome and time consuming to convince the guards posted around to allow one to click a few photographs of at least the excellently painted exterior surfaces. The limited dimly-lit interiors have been converted into a small museum depicting fierce battle scenes, outstanding maps, antique weapons, old paintings, mediocre furniture, a huge, rather too flappy dress said to have been Tipu’s own garment and the aforementioned commemorative medallions issued by the British East India Co. following the 1799 Battle of Seringapatam. Following the battle of course, the graceful little residence was overtaken by the British forces and served as the official residence of Lord Wellesley. One cannot fail to notice the brilliantly (and quite recently) painted orange dove coats, strongly conflicting against the subdued brown-greens of the residence and surrounding expansive gardens, that are located immediately along the garden’s periphery walls on either side of the entrance gateway and appear like smaller, more rotund versions of the Jama Masjid’s twin minarets. This is the only monument on the trail that is thankfully properly maintained, efficiently restored and ticketed by the ASI (Entrance fees: Indians and citizens of SAARC countries: Rs 5; others: Rs 100).
Colors of Mysore
Said to have been built in AD 1719, the principal gateway of the fortress – “Elephant Gate” – located somewhere midway between the Daria Daulat Bagh and Tipu’s multi-tiered, utterly despoiled Flagstaff Tower (“Bateri”) from which one can have a bird’s eye view of the entire city, has recently been spruced up as part of an ASI-driven conservation effort (among other consequences of which is indeed the impeccably glaring coats of bright orange paint that were dowsed upon most of the monuments and bastions within the fortress complex) – opposite the gateway has been created an artificial mound over which are mounted miniscule replicas of the grand Sri Ranganathswamy temple, the magnificent Masjid-i-Ala and the simplistic summer residence flanked by childish-looking bastions and cannons.
Stunningly beautiful and delicately designed, Sultan Tipu’s family mausoleum, located near the Daria Daulat Bagh, is referred to as “Gumbaz” ("Domed structure") and was commissioned by him upon the uneventful demise of his father. The painstakingly sculpted structure, composed of a massive rectangular chamber surrounded by wide pillared colonnades and surmounted in its entirety by a high-necked, spellbinding onion dome crafted into such a kaleidoscope of geometric and floral motifs that one cannot but help gape at it awestruck and afterwards, when the initial bewilderment at its magnificence has tided over, continue photographing it from indescribably numerous angles and perspectives. Also noteworthy is the adaptation of highly polished, dark coffee brown Amphibolite rock to carve the stately pillars that delineate the colonnades. The moderately-proportioned and yet impressively exquisite mausoleum can be considered as the family funerary zone of Tipu’s family the same way that Humayun’s superlative mausoleum in Delhi is the resting place of several generations of Mughal Emperors, princes and princesses (refer Pixelated Memories - Humayun's Tomb complex).
Exquisite!
The spectacularly flamboyant interiors, painted opulently in lively, unbelievably strong shades of reds, orange and green, bear Tipu’s favorite “Bubri” or stylized tiger-stripe motif with which he passionately adorned every entity, living or not, associated with his being, including his soldier’s uniforms, his residences, weapons and cannons and even his father’s mausoleum! Within a wooden enclosure lie three massive graves within which respectively lie in eternal slumber the impressive Nawab Hyder Ali, his wife Fakhr un-nisa Fatima Saydani Begum Sahiba (daughter of Mir Muinuddin Sahib, Governor of Kurumgunda and Cudappa) and their son Sultan Fath Ali Khan Tipu Sahib – all three draped with enormous cloth sheets, the last obviously immense and glittering tiger-striped. Visitors treat the mausoleum like a dargah (sacred tomb of a holy man), referring to the enigmatic Sultan as “Hazrat Shaheed” (“Martyred Saint”) and celebrating his “urs” (death celebrations) the way one would do at a Sufi mausoleum with great festivities and decorations – the caretakers too, referring to themselves as poor men employed by the surviving descendants of Sultan Tipu, provide everyone with fragrant flower petals to drape the sarcophagus with – this of course entails an immense crowd around the enclosure at nearly, well, every single moment that the mausoleum is open for visitor entry and consequentially clicking an uncrowded, isolated photograph (the way I prefer it) is very nearly impossible – I did click three but had to spend slightly over half an hour standing in a corner of the chamber attempting to not touch the walls in any manner lest I spoil their ethereally beautiful painted surface. It is said that when the mortal remains of the martyred Tipu were found amidst the bloodied corpses and other ghastly residues of the fearsome battle, he was discovered to be smiling in death with his sabre clasped tightly in his hands, numerous sword, bayonet and bullet wounds on his head and body and not a single defensive weapon upon him. Fifteen years later, Scottish novelist-poet-playwright Sir Walter Scott (lived 1771-1832) could not help admonishing Napoleon Bonaparte, the Emperor of France and Italy (reign AD 1804-14), by comparing him to the noteworthy Tipu and his lesser-known father thus –
“Although I never supposed that he (Napoleon) possessed, allowing for some difference of education, the liberality of conduct and political views which were sometimes exhibited by old Hyder Ali, yet I did think he might have shown the same resolved and dogged spirit of resolution which induced Tipu Sahib to die manfully upon the breach of his capital city with his sabre clenched in his hand."
Such vibrance! Such patterns!
The colonnades and the large plinth surrounding the tomb chamber too are lined with numerous graves, some ordinarily plastered over, others faced with marble slabs, belonging to numerous of Tipu’s family, relatives and associates including his foster mother Madeena Begum – to one’s utter surprise, there must literally be at least two or three score graves here, with several even lining the grassy lawns that surround the structure! Originally, the gardens surrounding the mausoleum were planted with rose apples, pomegranates, custard apples, citrus, peaches, mangoes, mulberries and oranges besides ornamental flowering trees and cypresses! A gorgeous mosque, possessing slender ornamental minarets along its sides, and a complimentary building that functioned as a hospital financed by the Tiger from his personal wealth exist on either side of the mausoleum. Realizing that it shall comprehensibly prove to be a daunting challenge to describe the mausoleum and the mosque’s numerous excellent ornamental features, I have to concede that for a change it is advisable to let the photographs speak for themselves.
Leaving the city behind, one cannot help admire the courageous Sultan for his architectural and artistic contributions to Mysore/Mandya’s heritage scene as much as for his military ingeniousness and command. One’s grief at the wanton destruction of the legendary city finds release in the words of the writer-musician Grant Gordon in his book “Cobras in the Rough” –
“Tipu Sultan’s city is long destroyed. After the British and their allies finally seized it after a siege of several months, they razed it almost to the ground. As a symbol of the military ruthlessness of the East India Company, it did the job. As an act of British imperial cultural barbarism, it was not atypical.”
The lingering feeling is that of disappointment, of witnessing visual and religious compositions that failed to live up to the anticipations, of knowing that while the entire city has been unambiguously declared a “historical township”, it offers little by way of documentation or architectural heritage, properly conserved and presented, to hold a visitor spellbound and rapt with attention. If only!
Location: District Mandya, approximately 15 kilometers from Mysore
How to reach: Buses/autos are available from Mysore. Any bus plying on Bangalore-Mysore highway will also stop at Seringapatam if asked to.
Entrance fees: Nil for most of the monuments. For Daria Daulat Bagh: Indians and citizens of SAARC countries: Rs 5; others: Rs 100
Time required for sightseeing: 3 hrs. It is advisable to hire a guide with an auto-rickshaw from near the mosque who'll show one around the entire city for Rs 300 (of course, one will have to bargain down from the quoted price which can be as much as Rs 700-800).
Other palaces constructed by Tipu Sultan in Karnataka -
Pixelated Memories - Nandi Hills (Nandidurga fortress and Tipu Sultan's palace), Chikkaballapur
Pixelated Memories - Tipu Sultan's Palace and Kote Venkataramana Temple, Bangalore
The mosque in Calcutta associated with Tipu Sultan's family - Pixelated Memories - Tipu Sultan Shahi Mosque
Another palace located in nearby Mysore - Pixelated Memories - Mysore Palace
Blogs.ucl.ac.uk - Casket Case Study: Material Culture from Seringapatam
Grandpoohbah.blogspot.in - Srirangapatnam
Llewelynmorgan.wordpress.com - Big Cat Hunting at Seringapatam
Mq.edu.au - Francis Buchanan: Description of Tipu's Palaces and Apartments at Seringapatam
Royalark.net - The Family of Tipu Sultan
Thehindu.com - Article "There is life at the cemetery" (dated March 09, 2013) by M.T. Shiva Kumar
Thehindu.com - Article "This day that year in ‘Seringapatam’" (dated May 04, 2014)
Tigerandthistle.net (Fascinating insight into the life and times of Tipu Sultan and Scottish soldiers of British East India Co.)
Toshkhana.wordpress.com (Fascinating insight into the life and times of Tipu Sultan)
Voiceofdharma.org - Tipu Sultan: As known in Kerala
Wikipedia.org - Tipu Sultan
Posted by Pixelated Memories at 6:27 pm 1 comment:
Labels: Anglo-Mysore War, Architecture, Daria Daulat Bagh, Dungeon, Gateways, Gumbaz mausoleum, History, Jama Masjid, Karnataka, Mandya, Mosque, Mysore, Palaces, Prison, Seringapatam, Srirangapatna, Temple, Tipu Sultan
Qila Rai Pithora, Saket, Delhi
“Primordial Delhi set the pattern for violence – it has always marked the city’s existence. Small wonder that all the Delhis that were to follow faced political upheaval involving a fair amount of violence. The first recorded war for the throne of Delhi – mythological as it might be – is narrated in the Mahabharata.”
– Raza Rumi, “Delhi by heart”
For a historical entity whose near-perennial existence chronologically spans over 5,000 years and is yet far from culmination, a singular diurnal event might as well be regarded as a minor occurrence with unbelievably little chance of surviving in memory and consequences against the rapid passage of the sands of time – and yet, occasionally transpires a remarkable event, often unforeseen, that, through the repercussions that follow its manifestation, literally mutates for successive ages not only the physical landscape but also the emotional and creative wellbeing of the entity involved. With respect to Delhi’s unrelentingly fierce and unusual history, this one event can at best be summed up into one particular moment of enormously significant impact – the defeat of Maharaja Prithviraj Chauhan III’s powerful armies at the hands of the fearsome forces commanded by Sultan Muhammad Muizzuddin ibn Sam Shihabuddin Ghuri in the Second Battle of Tarain (AD 1192). The sudden military upheaval that witnessed the transformation of the powers that be of Delhi, altogether a formidable regime in terms of territorial and financial capabilities, from native Hindu to Turkish-Afghan Islamic Emperors left behind an unsurpassable legacy in terms of religious, architectural-artistic and emotional existence of the entire subcontinent and continues to pose far-reaching effects that unceasingly evade conclusion – of these, of course, the foremost being the question of the religious subdual, inexorable massacre, chronic exploitation, remorseless enslavement and cultural genocide of the Hindu population of the country at the hands of these foreigner Islamic armies and the post-independence status – religious, cultural as well as territorial – of the descendants of these ravaging Muslim invaders and the natives whom they converted to Islam over several centuries of uninterrupted reign.
As gleamed off from the epic poem “Prithviraj Raso” composed by contemporaneous bard Chand Bardai, highly embellished and often fabricated threads of mythology and bardic folklore juxtapose with cruel facts of history to constitute the life, territorial domains and exploits of Prithviraj Chauhan who presently is unambiguously regarded as one of the foremost rulers to have reigned over the subcontinent and presented an aggressive opposition to the relentless fanatical forces of pillaging-plundering Islamic invaders. He defeated, albeit not crushingly, Muhammad Ghuri and magnanimously set him free, only to be ruthlessly opposed, contemptuously defeated, barbarically imprisoned and disdainfully dragged as a captive to the vast, unpitying plains of Afghanistan the very next year by him. Of course, the decimation of the armies commanded by Maharaja Prithviraj, who was bequeathed the throne of Delhi at the age of 13 by his maternal grandfather Anangpal Tomar II (another theory is that Prithviraj defeated Anangpal around 1150-60 AD), had less to do with the military might of the enemy and more to do with his own policy of territorial aggression against his neighbors which alienated him from all the major political centers and warlords of the country, including his own father-in-law Raja Jaichand Rathore of Kannauj (in modern-day Uttar Pradesh) whom he unrepentantly humiliated by arriving uninvited at his daughter’s “Swayamvar” (where a princess chooses her husband from amongst the assembled suitors) and eloping with her.
The first Delhi
In Afghanistan, the formerly mighty king was beaten mercilessly and blinded by the soldiers of Muhammad Ghuri and dragged alongside the regal procession so he can witness the proceedings and rue his own pitiful existence – on one such ordeal, observing an archery competition, he expressed his wish to participate against a worthy opponent – Sultan Ghuri himself if he dared face him – only to be ridiculed and taken to the task. Chand Bardai (who claimed to be a captive himself in the exceedingly long train of enslaved prisoners) magnifies Maharaja Prithviraj’s feats by claiming that he killed Ghuri by shooting a “Shabadbhedi baan” whereby an archer, blind or blindfolded, estimates and targets his enemy by merely listening to his voice! He was afterwards brutally murdered by the rampaging soldiers of Sultan Muhammad and his sarcophagus in Afghanistan, located immediately adjacent the latter’s, is still abused, spat upon and stomped on by Afghan locals and warlords alike – occasional noises are made by Indian Parliamentarians and Hindu leaders to have the remains exhumed and transported back to Delhi, but, as is the case with all noise, it too fizzles out and is forgotten without much action or groundwork. The fact is of course not recorded in history and Muhammad Ghuri’s own chronicles record that Maharaja Prithviraj had attempted to flee the battlefield in the face of disgraceful defeat and captured and executed on the battlefield, though Sultan Muhammad decreed that his bloodied mortal remains be carried to Afghanistan where he be buried like a Muslim as a final humiliation heaped post-death. Sultan Muhammad himself was later assassinated by the henchmen of some local warlords.
It would come as a surprise to note that the remains of Maharaja Prithviraj’s impregnable fortress’ unassailably thick rubble walls exist merely a stone’s throw away from the perennially crowded Saket metro station-bus stop combine! Notwithstanding how impressive the ruins are, one could be forgiven to wonder why Emperors would face off for these stones and sacrifice the lives of hundreds of thousands of praiseworthy loyal men. Christened Qila Rai Pithora after Rai Pithor as Maharaja Prithviraj was often referred to as, the colossal fortress’s periphery walls, appearing like a grey-red pearl necklace, survive as a perceptibly curving thick curtain wall punctuated by enormous fortified bastions that exist as mere stubs weathered almost to the base by the unremitting forces of nature and the advance of urbanization and construction which over time prompted the inhabitants of the surrounding areas to even cart off the rubble to build new edifices. Along its sides runs a narrow tract of grass-shrouded lawn, dotted with thorny shrubbery and the occasional Indian Laburnum trees (“Amaltas”/Cassia fistula) indiscriminately showering the ground around with heartwarming golden-yellow petals, which delineates and veils it against the flow of traffic and the peering eyes that peep through the numerous residential blocks existential across the road. But tread the ground for almost a kilometer and chillum-smoking groups of youngsters give way to dreadfully silent isolation; vibrant, brilliantly colored butterflies disappear and in their place appear huge hornets and hordes of persistently buzzing, low flying mosquitoes; and the grass carpet turns into deep, mushy soil that smells of rot and dung and death by stench! The fortress walls themselves, in the beginning 2-18 feet high and 5-6 feet thick, transform into near-collapsed ruins, the glimmering grey quartzite dressing disappearing and revealing the brown-red underbelly of brick and mortar, threateningly reclaimed by foliage and thoroughly colonized by overwhelming shrubbery and vines into thick, dangerously dark and grotesquely gnarled wild hedges – the desolation is total, the stillness ear-splitting.
Gazing at the ruined desolation, one cannot help reminiscing the words of Bahadur Shah “Zafar” II (reign AD 1837-57), the last Emperor of Delhi –
“Nahi haal-e-Dehli sunane ke qabil, ye qissa hai rone rulane ke qabil
Ujade luteron ne wo qasr is ke jo the dekhne aur dikhane ke qabil
Na ghar hai na dar hai raha ik Zafar hai, faqat haal-e-Dehli sunane ke qabil”
(“Not worthy of narration is the tale of Delhi. This story is for crying and wailing
Raiders have destroyed such palaces that were to be praised and described
Neither home is left nor hearth, Only Zafar remains to tell the tale of Delhi")
Location: Couple of meters from Saket Metro station on the road leading to the garden of Five Senses (Coordinates: 28°31'13.2"N 77°11'58.7"E)
Nearest Metro station: Saket (Saiyadul Ajaib exit)
Nearest Bus stop: Saket metro station
Other monuments/landmarks located in the vicinity -
Pixelated Memories - Dargah Dhaula Peer
Pixelated Memories - Khirki Masjid
Pixelated Memories - Mehrauli Archaeological Park
Pixelated Memories - Satpula
Pixelated Memories - Tughlaqabad Fortress Complex
Ghumakkar.com - "Qila Rai Pithora – the First City of Delhi" (dated April 19, 2013) by Nirdesh Singh
Wikipedia.org - Muhammad of Ghor
Wikipedia.org - Prithviraj Chauhan
Labels: Architecture, Battle of Tarain, Chand Bardai, Delhi, Fortress, Hindu-Muslim conflict, History, Monument, Muhammad Ghuri, Mythology, Prithviraj Chauhan, Prithviraj Raso, Qila Rai Pithora, Ruins, Saket
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Thaksin’s score Part 1
If you decided to keep score on the convicted fugitive Thaksin Shinawatra and who he associates with, it becomes an interesting reflection of what his world is like today. But no matter how you look at it, this is a fun read that cuts past his attempted self image.
Connecting the Dots thought it would be amusing to follow Thaksin’s trail for a while and see where he turned up. Then take a look at how each of those places scored in various categories and what Thaksin did there. Simply put, this is a fun trail of dots. We have chosen worldaudit.org site to use as a country rating source. We are using the November 2009 ratings for this entry. Although there are several categories for ranking, we are using the corruption category and the democracy category.
On that scale Thailand ranks 64 for corruption and 87 for democracy . Seeing that Thaksin has been seeking ‘True Democracy’, you will be able to see just where he is looking. When looking at the numbers for each country, the lower the number the better the score.
Picking a starting point we would need to say that when Thaksin got his British United Kingdom visa canceled while he was off on a trouble making mission is a good place to start. The UK is ranked 14 for corruption and 13 for democracy. Thaksin was busy flaunting he was in London to boost his image, but when he left to go on a political attack, his visa was canceled hours after he left. Needless to say that translates to Don’t come back.
From there Thaksin seemed to have found his new nest in the United Arab Emirates. The rules were simple, business only and no politics from UAE soil. Needless to say Thaksin did not listen and as a result they told him to leave because he could not behave and follow the rules. The UAE is ranked 23 for corruption and 73 for democracy.
Thaksin also snuck into Germany for a while and the operative word is snuck as they did not want him there. When they discovered him they informed him he would be arrested if he tried it again. This amounts to someone breaking into your house and staying there while you are away on holiday. Germany ranks 11 for corruption and 11 for democracy.
From there Thaksin decided that Central America would be a good place to visit and Thaksin went to Nicaragua. While he was there he managed to get his hands on a diplomatic passport from that country. There is little doubt that was purchased in one form or another. The vagueness of the answers from Nicaragua about the passport strongly suggest that it was issued in ways that did not follow standard protocols. Nicaragua ranks 103 for corruption and 82 for democracy. We are not sure what Thaksin’s status is there but with a corruption rating over 100, Thaksin no doubt feels right at home there.
After that There was a few visits to Zimbabwe and apparently made some investments there to get on better footing with the government. Zimbabwe ranks 117 for corruption and 141 for democracy.
Next Part 2 of 3
Thailand Thaksin Nicaragua Diplomatic passports are issued to people doing official work for the government that issued the...
Thaksin signals he has not given up It did not take long for Thaksin to signal with his actions that he has...
Thaksin’s passport squeeze It would seem according to news reports that countries that have issued passports to the...
Lawless Thaksin digs his hole deeper It was classic Thaksin arrogance for all the world to see. This time it was...
Thaksin on defensive It took a little while to be sure, but it is clear now the convicted...
This entry was posted in Afghanistan Burma Cambodia Central America Corruption European Union Fiji France Germany Great Britain Haiti International Politics Law And Order Montenegro NATO New Zealand Nicaragua Satire Series Somalia Sweden Terrorism Thailand Uganda United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States War and Conflict Zimbabwe and tagged bribes democracy diplomatic passport Hun Sen Junta money passport Red Shirts Somali pirates Taliban Thaksin
December 29, 2017 Richard
Perhaps 2017 is best called the year of denial. Ignoring known facts and pushing forward with politi...
Thinking that truly innocent people will come out of the justice system with vindication is just thi...
« Doomsday fart Thaksin’s score Part 2 »
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No Church In The Wild A short read about how thoughts become words.
December 1, 2012 September 16, 2015 6 minute readby remythequill
It all starts in the back streets of my mind where the cracks harbour half-thoughts, faded images, and stimuli to which I have not yet reacted. In these streets, perennially shrouded in twilight, sustainable creativity is so scarce only the strongest and the most ruthless ideals can survive. Even the elementals refuse to stay here for long; the light visits occasionally in the early hours. But it makes itself scarcer as the day wears on. The wind, more finite than the bleak light that attempts to illuminate this world, slithers into the small chinks between reality and fiction, out of sight and memory. It, too, tries not to tarry here lest it becomes trapped by some hungry thought.
This is where it all starts.
Something moves as it wakes deep within a hidden lair. It stretches and flexes. And then it shakes itself, dislodging slumber from its deformed body. Its aura spreads out and puts everything near and far on high alert. Everything waits with bated breath to see if the thing will go back to sleep. History, or whatever memories can be collected from this place, shows that the waking of such a thing rarely ends well for the inhabitants of this world at the back of worlds. Every stray thought, dream, and wish cowers in fear, dreading what the countless seconds will bring. The thing opens its cavernous mouth and yawns. And then it roars.
No happy endings today. The thing is awake. And worst of all, the thing is in a violent and hungry mood.
The thing crawls out of its lair. It emerges onto the barren streets, surveys its surroundings and yawns again. It has a gnawing hunger in the pit of its stomach. It must feed.
It prowls the endless streets, preying on smaller and weaker thoughts, extinguishing fragments of light bulb moments that are too feeble to fight against it. The thing ferrets them out of their burrows and consumes the small morsels whole. As it feeds its form changes, it grows legs and arms, a head, a pair of eyes and ears, and a smile that scars across its face. It is still hungry, but this desert land of incomplete thoughts and echoing buildings cannot sate its hunger. It needs something more substantial than a long forgotten phantasm of times gone by. Steered by its gnawing hunger it turns its direction to the leafier suburbs of my mind, escaping the thought-eat-thought world of its origin.
It marches down the streets from its lair in the ghettoes of my mind to the cleaner, cohesive suburbs where I keep my happiness and childhood dreams to raid them for a commodity that cannot be found in the unknown lands of its birth: words.
Meticulously collected from books, films, conversations with friends, and general life, words are the only way the creature can silence the rumblings of its stomach, it is the only way it can keep its shape and form—it is the only way that the thing can prevent its own disintegration and gradual fading back to the twilight world that it has just escaped. Words. It needs them. It wants them. It looks for them. And it finds them. First in scarce quantities in the industrial outskirts of my being where creativity has been mechanised and made routine to provide power to the busier and frenetic hub at the centre of my mind. Here it finds the words it needs to concentrate its thought; it devours and adopts itself to my artistic style. As it feeds its desire becomes more focused. Its vision, once murky, comes closer and closer to articulation. At this stage it is nothing more than a collection of desire and various rules. It needs something more. It needs a name.
Stronger, now, and more cunning, the thing casts its eye afield once more and marches upon the City.
Its march brings war.
To cover more ground the thing clones itself and splits into riotous, pillaging mobs. They come shrieking and howling, biting and scratching, burning and looting into the City. They ransack houses and libraries, they eat feelings and thoughts, and, wherever they find words they steal and kill their previous owners. Soon the streets are filled with the remains of discarded wit, humour trickles down the gutters. Smoke rises from burnt and shellacked homes where summer thoughts and spring memories used to live. Autumn has come to City; the winter is going to be a bitch.
The mob grows as it pillages, each individual part becomes bigger as it feeds on music, or musings on art. The things learn what a cool, seaside breeze feels like; they taste home and become intoxicated on travel. They experience the painful transition from we to the singular and solitary I.
The war rages on. The mob becomes ungovernable and uncontrollable. The thing is here and there at the same time. It becomes more self-aware by the minute. It walks down the streets, a tattered flag in one hand and a Molotov cocktail in the other. Every few blocks it stops and gives the world a generous sip.
Fire. Explosions. Carnage. The City burns.
The mob collects things that it might need. Long slave lines of metaphors, similes, and other figures of speech are pulled and whipped along cracked streets to the cynosure of the City where the thing awaits. The best ones will be consumed by the thing; the rest will be put to hard labour, constructing a name not of their choosing.
Nothing is left unscathed. Everything burns.
Eventually, as the mob has its blood-lust sated the thing collects itself together. It has fashioned itself an identity from all the stolen words. It now knows what it wants and how to get it. It has a name. From its first awakening in the dingy back streets of a place without a name to this final moment on the grassy knoll in the City’s mecca the thing has grown in power and bends everything to its will. It surveys the mayhem that has shadowed every step it has taken since its conception. It smiles to itself. With the passage of time life will return to the City. The thing knows it is just the latest conqueror of this world, it knows it cannot stay. There is no throne to sit, one thing comes and another one goes.
The mob morphs into the thing. The many become one again. It is time to be leaving this internal place of words, of music that the rest of the world cannot here.
The thing looks up to the sky and takes a deep breath. It summons all of my being, pulling all of the necessary muscles at the right time, uncapping my pen and scratching the words it dictates onto the paper.
And then I will write until the thing tells me to stop.
Author’s note: This piece had various titles until I settled on No Church in the Wild, borrowed from Jay-Z and Kanye West, which has been the anarchic soundtrack of the past two months.
Tags: add more tea, autobio, headspace / Category: Words
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Sarah Jacoby Architect
Brooklyn Rowhouse
For this rowhouse in Brooklyn’s Flatbush neighborhood, SJA transformed an outdated residence into a contemporary and abundantly daylit living space for a young family. Our client wanted an open floor plan, but the existing house was a labyrinth of closed-off spaces separated by walls. So we gut-renovated it, allowing light and movement to flow more freely throughout the shared and private areas of the house. We removed a load-bearing wall and interior partitions, replacing them with exposed steel beams. New full-height windows further brighten the space, as well as a new glass door that opens onto a newly designed terrace, connecting the interior space to a quaint backyard. The home’s second floor, which was designated as a tenant unit, was completely reconfigured and updated. To make the pre-existing inner room a legal bedroom an operable skylight was added and the narrow galley kitchen opened up to make a generous kitchen/living/dining space. A washer-dryer was tucked in, maximizing amenities for a market rate 3-bedroom rental. SJA also dug out and finished the basement to provide additional space for storage and recreation, adding functional square footage to the home’s compact footprint.
Images by Ty Cole Photography
© 2017 Sarah Jacoby Architect
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Arts Writing
Chapbook Publisher
Econo Textual Objects
Raquel Gutiérrez
10 Mexican Days
One of my colleagues at work asked me if I had fun while in Mexico City a few weeks ago. I felt my brows furrow as I thought about it and answered a plaintive no. It's notthat I didn't enjoy visiting the world class city. I went to Mexico City for the first time as an adult and in the context of an artistic exchange where the bulk of the conversations with artists, writers, cultural producers and journalists centered on the myriad of ways we understand violence and the blood economies from where it originates. Preparing for these conversations compelled me to be versed in diverse narratives of violence, such as books by Charles Bowden, films by María Novaro and Luis Estrada, and of course music by Los Tigres Del Norte (the latter being the source of many teenage tantrums after losing control of the tape deck on family trips to Tijuana to see the dentist). It is a range of narratives that explore violence with both a heavy hand and a tongue in cheek. I hadn't spent this much time with intense brutality since my days reading about the civil wars in El Salvador and Guatemala while minoring in Central American Studies at Cal State Northridge.
These particular ethnic studies were a way to study myself, to contemplate where I came from as a child born in Los Angeles to a Salvadoran mother. My mom, one of nine kids (originally 12, but 3 died before the age of 3) grew up in a small hamlet on the border between El Salvador and Honduras, became a registered nurse who worked in San Salvador and ended fleeing not a civil war but an abusive husband who kept my older brother away from her for over six years. My mother fled one type of violence and arrived to encounter another kind in the U.S.—poverty. She was one of fourteen living in a house on Coronado Street in Echo Park—una arrimada, she called herself, or someone “leaning” on others for a few weeks without paying rent until an opportunity arose.
Being eye-deep in the grisly accounts of the kinds of border violence that happens to Central American migrants passing through Mexico gave me pause. I’m thankful my mother didn’t encounter deadly train robbers or Zetas terror, the kind that coerces migrants into dark economies or mass graves. Instead, my mom won a visa lottery that enabled her to get to Las Vegas to take care of children, clean homes and hotel rooms before arriving to Los Angeles in 1969.
All of our lives are a series of choices—left or right, east or west, stay or go. I think about my parents’ choices to leave their countries and wonder if I would do the same. Here is a hypothetical situation—what if I was born in Mexico? The idea comes up while I am getting into a fair amount of gender trouble while traveling around the Mexican capital. I wonder if the psychic toll would propel me forward to try my hand at being in a country that was more “tolerant” of my gender non-conformity. It’s not like being told I was in the wrong bathroom was hardly a point of contention with the country from where my father emigrated from; it's not the first time and certainly won't be the last time I get caballero'ed during dinner or joven'ed on an Aeromexico flight back to Los Angeles. These are only just a sample of the kinds of passive, or soft, violence that gender non-conforming people survive every day on both sides of the border. If and when luck is on our side we hear the nagging voice—maybe it’s intuition telling you to move out of harm’s way.
Lots of queers living in large metropolitan areas get harassed, bullied, assaulted and murdered. I have been spared heretofore the rod of homophobes glowering at me and my thug-dandy ways. However, it isn’t always the case for my queer brothers and sisters, many of whom self-medicate when the burden of challenging society’s narrow gender norms becomes too much to bear. The scythe sweeps down or comes close; another gender renegade’s life gets cut short whether it’s a bullet or a hypodermic needle. The rest of us are left mourning or wanting immediate escapist gratification.
So I wasn't surprised when I came home from Mexico City with a bout of low-grade humming depression. The analog kind; knowing that violence is always playing in the background, like a radio with a fuzzy signal at the lowest volume possible that allows you to know it is still there. Even when you see violence negotiated through the lens of artistic production, you are saddled with a particular type of compassion and empathy in your critical viewing that has to be balanced out with both grief and fatigue in order to keep it from totally consuming you. Because that is what the violence portends—that you will be consumed.
Consumption. Like a Victorian novel way of meeting your maker, or at least experiencing the symbolic death that artists in privileged spaces get to while the extreme poor suffer horrible conditions, like the 165 U.S.-bound migrants, mostly Central Americans, that were_held against their will in Tamaulipas near the border town of Laredo, Texas by drug traffickers and liberated on June 5, 2013.
But I don’t escape to shirk the duty to listen anymore, to bear witness for other witnesses.
At least, not with drugs.
La Guerra De Los Dos Lados/The War On Both Sides explores the representations of violence through conversations with groups of artists throughout the week we were there. Every morning over black bean breakfast tamales and mud_thick coffee Rubén, Rafa and anticipated conversations that might focus on the political, or the aesthetic or the social implications of violence, or the violence we render in our work. It was exciting and of course, anxiety-producing, wondering what grab bag of artists and thinkers we'd be paired with each day and if there would be any chemistry around our mission or if we would be burdened with identity politics about being Chicanos and Pochos and the concomitant nopal on our foreheads with surfer cadences to our English that operate like broken traffic signals and slow down our attempts to connect.
But that was never the case on this journey, where other classed anxieties were present; I'm a child of economic migrants who came to Los Angeles from Mexico and El Salvador in the late 1960s, finding each other--my father and mother--in an East Los Angeles dancehall one fateful Valentine's eve. Now my parents are U.S. citizens and their experience is so different from the migratory patterns of the impoverished men and women and children that travel out of the countries of my parents’ origin. Or those that don’t, like the 72 people massacred by los Zetas in a village called El Huizachal in the municipality of San Fernando, Tamaulipas in 2010; their names, ages, genders and nationalities and humanity restored with great care in the poem Los Muertos, written by María Rivera of Mexico City and read out in pure oratory power on April 6, 2011 during the National March for Peace that Javier Sicilia galvanized less than two weeks after his son Juan Francisco was murdered by cartel-affiliated assassins.
Violence happens every day that we talk about violence. The time we spend meditating about how we negotiate impotence while we stand in front of your or my generation’s Guernica and The Third of May 1808, is a privileged yet fraught space. Every day we talked about violence in our Mexico City ateliers, real violence occurred in parts of Chihuahua City, Reynosa, and Ciudad Juarez. As cultural workers, we consider violence in the works of pulp novelist Elmer Mendoza or visual artist Teresa Margolles (both from Culiacan, Sinaloa, where the Sinaloa Cartel is centered) in order to complete the task of holding critical spaces, which is a lot like holding your breath. It becomes necessary to deeply consider the scope and foreclosing limitations brought about by representations of violence but it is difficult. It feels like self-harm. These works become a reference we necessarily make about violence in order to talk about healing, which is kind of like needing to step over the bodies to make room for the living.
In our first conversation that week, we spent time with Gabriela Jauregui's and her poem Oasis of power/Oasis of horror. The authoritative voice in this piece creates an already negotiated position in an account of violence that is not necessarily culled from an archive of personal agency or trauma but of a constructed witnessing. Nevertheless, these invented perspectives make it into Gabriela’s work as a way to imagine hearing the elusive voice of assasins in a complex web of mercenary marketability. She provides our need to understand the darkness enfleshed in the men who make predators and the possiblity that we could dare to empathize with them.
The following are excerpted stanzas from Gabriela’s poem.
Juaristán is my playground,
Juareztine is my home,
King of my mono-metal reign of bullets
Here we celebrate more deaths than births every day
I make bullets rain over the border on the other side of the river
So El Paso sees me shine seems me fly through its skies in a flash
I am the fastest golden sun
I blow up cars I blow up homes I blow I blow I blow
Silvertip, Semispitzer, Hollow Point, Teflon-covered, Very Low Drag, Total
Metal Jacket, Lead Bullet, Full Metal Case, Speer Gold Dot, Remington
Core-Lokt, Armor-Piercing, Gold Sabre
I’ll take you to Salón Río Bravo but first to El Herradero where it’s all about
meat meat meat so you can meet my team of killer flesh fresh-shaved-headcholos (long
shorts long socks long barrel) and my python-tipped cowboys:
we are all gold-chained
and after and always we go to taquería Iris then sex at the oxxo in excess
chica cachonda busca chico en Chihuahua
As is. So: pare down this rape
pare down and peel and cut open and trim and carve and skin and scalp and
flay and decorticate
AK47 I own you now woman
We hear from the woman in the second part Oasis of horror:
On my way to work I see the children outside my house play sicarios, narcos
and policemen with sticks and stones
they know the caliber of every gun, of every bullet they carve
in stone and gavel and play-doh
they know bones and they’re dead wrong
now they’re dead
and still wrong
while I am forced to listen to Juan Gabriel’s greatest hits
smothered and
is my throat
my slit
filled with silt
a river dries
Irene Silvia Mercedes saints in the desert
bonedry
flow nowhere
no place for slits
and lipstick lips
mujer muerta
and what you hear now is the sand that buries me telling my story to
Gabriela creates a counter-narrative to the feminine position in Juarez. The feminine has become ossified with fatigue after too many escorted trips to the local OXXOs in Ciudad Juarez, a perspective produced during a writer’s residency in Juárez that lodged her deep in the deadly reality. The threat of rape is real, actual rape is always a looming specter if you are female-bodied in any part of the world, so just because it didn’t happen to you—that you are still alive as far as you can tell—does not preclude the obligation to make work about it about in fast-moving cinematic language.
Or maybe it does? In the poetic inventions contingent on la memoria ajena (the other’s memory) where implications are embedded in different feminine voices urging the reader to keep seeing the city named after Benito Juarez drenched in blood; pulling gendered violence out from the ether and imploring us to see the slits filled with silt and not be at all comfortable in the reproducing of the same narco sensationalist discourse its intending to criticize. In Gabriela’s poem even Juan Gabriel is implicated.
Artistic interrogations made in comfortable art spaces produce ambivalence about the cushy and inaccessible place art inhabits amongst the general populace, at least back home in California where each year, art education becomes the first to go in dwindling school budgets which makes art appreciation a relic. So who is art for and why the need for these conversations when we don’t have the tools to forge the next generation of art lovers that emerge from communities of color?
However, these artistic interrogations for the many of us that did emerge from beautiful barrios in and around Los Angeles produce a hope illustrated in the way our new friends and colegas stage an intertexual conversation with one another and with each other’s work about violence.
Narco-mantas (banners) came up a lot throughout the week’s conversations. These banners are the propaganda between warring cartels, hung over bridges or near a pile of deliberately placed dead bodies. Cartels claim responsibility for murders and warn rivals and police to stay away from their territories or to recruit locals into their armies. Narcomantas became a rich site of interrogation for artists, as they can be mixed and re-mixed to produce radically different, darkly humorous or curiously gendered texts and placed in public sites to produce a different set of responses outside or beyond compulsory terror, or to comment on the range of soft violences many of Mexico’s citizens experience daily, as seen in the work of Julio Torres. Julio’s piece En Este Pueblo Ya No Cabemos Los Jotos on the homophobia that saturates his hometown of Mexicali, even though, ironically, he was unaware that his banner media was the favored means of cartel communication.
However difficult it is to revisit work made as President Felipe Calderón entered office in 2006, it was worth it to arrive at a resensitizing about why writing about violence is violent. So our conversation landed on the important question--how to make work that does not revictimize the victims? This question becomes important with each new conversation. John Gibler, who has been in Mexico since the late 1990s, doing solidarity work with the Zapatistas and the late human rights lawyer Digna Ochoa, and who now writes and contributes to news sources such as Pacifica radio station KPFA in Berkeley and publications such as Z Magazine, Left Turn and Colorlines. John has seen firsthand contemporary Mexico shift from being a country complicated by neoliberal policies like NAFTA to a deadly environment fueled by impunity for the indigenous population, women and human rights activists. As a person, John is open, warm and humble as all get out. Reading his books you will know that he has seen his share of humanity’s worst attributes as well as gun fights. I wonder how does someone who has reported on so much violence—even the sexual violence committed against the 26 women in the wake of riots in San Salvador Atenco in 2006, many of whom are John’s friends—continue to be impelled by a deep well of optimism?
I reach for my copy of John’s book of poems 20 poemas para ser leídos en una balacera (20 Poems To Be Read During A Shoot-Out). It begins with a series of alerts for the new guy to get down. The reality surrounding him is one where a bullet is followed by a hundred and impunity reigns supreme. The poem’s hardened guide might be an adrenaline junkie as he gleefully tells the new guy that even as you run away from the lead-heavy shower of brutality in a zig-zag formation be sure to guard your disgust against jadedness. You can never forget that this is home for you and thousands of Mexicans who deal with this daily occurrence and every day is worth the risk.
As cultural producers we use words, objects, and intention to create a different world that offsets the traumas of the world we inhabit that’s been riddled by bullets and indifference. Creating these worlds often become a convergence of blessings, curses, risks, burdens and privileges that haunt the daily task of imagining justice.
During one of the week’s first conversations, Jen Hofer referenced Audre Lorde's famous adage: the master's tools can't dismantle the master's house. She called for all of us to adopt the need for new, different tools that expose the relationship between power and language and to be ready to see how they embed in one another to produce an oppressive regime. Jen compels us to be something I imagine John already is--different. We have to be different in order to imagine a just world; to become listeners and inquisitive about human life in other parts of the world. Even John’s assertion that he “receives” art rather than consumes it, reveals a lot in the little ways we can reinscribe our relationship to the world we want to inhabit.
Later in the week I stepped away from these conversations and into Mexico City. I saw art that Mexican-American journalist and author Daniel Hernández wants Americans to witness and be troubled by. Daniel told me about Martha Pacheco’s new exhibition at the Museo de Arte Moderno, Excluidos y Acallados (Excluded and Silenced), curated by Alicia Lozano. This is a series of oil paintings of cadavers that have not been named or claimed by family members that Pacheco photographs and then paints. I was struck by the light in her paintings—the vividness of the fluorescent lighting in her oils eerily accent the red blood of her victims gaping wounds and sloppy post-autopsy sutures.
There’s also a series of people that live in sanatoriums who Pacheco photographs and then paints from the photo she has taken. The pieces, part of a body of work spanning two decades, pose the question, according to the Lozano’s curatorial statement of who do we become when we are forced to confront matters of death and madness? It is strange seeing such grisly depictions of violent death in an art institution, supported generously by the Mexican government, where the curatorial or artist statements not make any mention or gesture to the current social context of drug-related violence. As part of the Guerra De Los Dos Lados, the only commentary I encounter about this show takes place within the four walls of our daily meetings inside the safety of another Mexico City museum, El Museo Del Chopo.
Is it possible to translate the culture of violence into an aesthetic site of healing? If, as Jen states, all literature is translation then perhaps the visual language that Martha Pacheco’s work employs could be considered primal screaming. Martha Pacheco’s images make the language of state silence strange, even when silence underscores the ability for the museum to exhibit her work. And that alone is possibly an extraordinary expression of that strangeness.
After ten days in Mexico, it is only the strange that feels familiar.
← El Danzante: on Rafa Esparza's ancestral nauseaNACO POWER (For The War on Both Sides) →
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Jennifer Aniston to Guest Star on Cougar Town
Jennifer Aniston and Courteney Cox are reuniting, if only for a night.
The best Friends will appear together on the second season premiere of Cougar Town, ABC announced Monday. The episode airs September 22.
Aniston, who is supposedly dating John Mayer again, will play a "shrink named Bonnie" to Cox's Jules, executive producer Bill Lawrence said.
Bill describes her as a "Kind of a get-too-involved-in-her-life-type of therapist" and says of Courtney and Jen: "Those guys are so close in real life they kind of do that for each other anyway. Bonnie has the life Jules wishes she has."
Courtney Cox and Jennifer Aniston will share the screen again.
The role might be more than a one-off, too: "We're very intentionally implying that it's a therapist Courteney has been using for a while" Lawrence says. "So I'm crossing my fingers that if [Jennifer] has a good time it'll happen again."
This is great news for Cougar Town fans, and Aniston personally. She could use some positive press after The Switch bombed at the box office this weekend.
Somewhere, Bill O'Reilly is smiling ... and considering what issue to blow out of proportion next while swan-diving into a pile of cash, Scrooge McDuck style.
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Follow me on Twitter @RuthASymes
Follow me on Twitter for a daily entertaining look at family history and history more generally
@RuthASymes
Picking out the quirky, the salient, the eccentric and the typical....
Unearthing Family Tree Mysteries Coming to the USA July 29th 2016
by Ruth A. Symes
OUT in the USA 29th July 2016.
Preorder now : http://amzn.to/262fu7D
How to find out more about your UK ancestor, including:
...the place he lived
...why his children died
...his working life
...whom he lived with
...why he emigrated/travelled
...what events he might have witnessed
...how he died
...what he ate and drank
...how he spoke and what he believed
Four innovative approaches to family history
4 books, 4 different approaches to family history
1. Unearthing Family Tree Mysteries, (Pen and Sword, 2016)
Shows you how to get the most out of documents about your ancestor (trade directories, birth, marriage and death certificates, censuses, newspapers, obituaries, passenger lists, passports, company newsletters, Bibles and books, diaries, songs, and recipes).
http://amzn.to/1UVu3GI
2. It Runs In The Family: Understanding More About Your Ancestors (The History Press, 2013)
Shows you how better to understand what your ancestor looked like and his/her personal effects (eyes, teeth, hair, beards, distinguishing characteristics, stature, rings, cuff links, buttons, brooches, flowers, and dogs).
http://amzn.to/1COD4Wh
3. Family First: Tracing Relationships in the Past (Pen and Sword, 2013)
Explains your ancestor's probable relationships with others in his/her family and community (fathers, mothers, babies, young siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents, friends, neighbours, club associates).
http://amzn.to/1VQwUSy
4. Tracing Your Ancestors Through Letters and Personal Writings, (Pen and Sword, 2016)
Shows you how better to read your ancestor's own writings (signatures, graffiti, letters, greeting cards, postcards, telegrams, appointment diaries, diaries, commonplace books, poetry)
OUT NOVEMBER 2016
Unearthing Family Tree Mysteries Coming to the USA...
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This is the gateway to
Perceptual Alternatives
originally the the domain of the Sonic Pathfinder and
other Electronic Travel Aids for the Blind, now,
since my retirement, an increasing number of other things!
by Tony Heyes (short cv)
Manningham U3A pages
Physics and Social Philosophy
In late July 2016, youngest son, Ben suffered a stroke while on a business trip to Hong Kong. Ben is currently undergoing intensive rehabilitation with the aim of picking up where he left off...
Son Ben Heyes spent six years working in various technical and liaison roles in national security and foreign intelligence but has come in from the cold and at the time of his stroke was the Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) with the Commonwealth Bank of Australia.
Ben is also Chair of Crest Australia, The Council of Registered Ethical Security Testers and a member of the Board of Directors of The Conversation, a collaboration between editors and academics to provide informed news analysis and commentary that’s free to read and republish.
Just prior to his stroke Ben was invited to accept the 2016 Distinguished Alumni Award from the Faculty of Information Technology, Monash University.
Ben suffers from Aphasia - this is Ben's last radio broadcast before he lost his voice.
from Down Under from The Cybersecurity Podcast.
Daughter in Law, Gabrielle (Gabby) Heyes, hails from Maryland. She has Law qualications in both the USA and Australia. She is a Senior Lawyer at ASIC , the Australian Securities and Investment Commission, keeping a very necessary watchful eye on Deposit Takers, Credit & Insurers.
The Brain Teaser page.
The Genealogy page - the Lancashire Heyeses and much more.
The Maps Page: surname distribution maps for the UK.
A famous relative - well, possibly: Thomas Heyes/Highs from Leigh in Lancashire, inventor of spinning machines, eg. the Spinning Jenny. (see Wiki)
My tribute page to a much loved seaside spot on the Lancashire coast; Knott-End-on-Sea
Mostly the work of one of my oldest friends, Gordon Heald. It presents Gordon's superbe historical maps of the area. Also reproductions of paintings done in the area by the celbrated artist L S Lowry. In addition a page by me explaining why, under very special atmospheric conditions, one can occasionally see the Isle of Man from the Knott-End promenade in-spite of it being over the horizon.
My father's page. In 1918 he flew with 55 Squadron along with W.E.Johns - the author of the Biggles books (see Wiki). Follow the link to Johns' vivid account of flying on bombing raids in open cockpit bi-planes during the First World War. Both men were shot down and taken prisoner!
An early invention: a Tactile Display for installation at Pedestrian Crossings
The Dangerous Delusions and Secular Ethics links page. Links to YouTube videos: Harris, Dawkins and more.
Please feel free to contact me .
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Hi, I'm Dr John T. Saxon.
Dr John T. Saxon
Another personal online presence that allows people to commit identity theft.
This page is also my CV so you can print it. It is what I'd send if I applied for a job.
There is quite a lot here for a regular web-page so here are three questions:
What have I learnt and where did I learn it?
Where have I applied that knowledge?
Oh, and I like running. It's fun.
I am a self-motivated and competent software engineer. The mixture of academic and industry work has enabled me to break down problems to design software such that it is extensible and future-proof. It has also provided me with the skills to analyse technologies and languages quickly to see what is suitable for individual tasks.
Consulting Software Engineer
I am a freelance software developer, primarily back-end, but I’m currently learning front-end development using JavaScript libraries/frameworks like React.
Software Engineer - Private Contract Feb 2018 — Present
I was contracted to refactor a tactile SVG application to teach basic four-function arithmetic. The idea of the application was that a visually impaired user could place a tactile printout of the interface over a touchscreen and then interact with the digital version. The refactor involved rewriting the application, from pure JavaScript, into TypeScript with the aid of the React library for the SVG interface.
Lead Software Engineer at Progressive Access Ltd Apr 2015 — Present
I was the lead software engineer for Progressive Access Ltd. The company itself had no central office and had employees scattered around the globe. We used Stack and video-conferencing to manage workloads and to discuss/synchronise with each other.
The primary goal of Progressive Access Ltd is to provide a generic workflow that enables users with visual impairments to read diagrams using SVG and screen readers. This process uses a plethora of languages as each component had particular requirements, but specifically C, Java, JavaScript, Kotlin and OCaml. An essential part of this work was to be able to integrate them into a web service using the Spring Framework and to formulate microservices to complete the interpretation of different domains in a scalable manner using Amazon Web Services. We were also investigating the provision of an external API to allow clients to send diagrams to us for recognition.
Senior Teaching Assistant Oct 2012 — Jun 2016
As a teaching assistant, I further aided in students’ development through small group tutorials, marking and demonstrating in labs. As a senior teaching assistant, I would plan tutorials and exercises, and manage other tutors to provide a consistent learning platform.
I primarily taught security modules and large enterprise system modules (Java).
I was awarded with the TA of the year for my second year of teaching.
Demonstrator Jan 2012 — Apr 2012
Demonstrating involved facilitating students’ learning by helping them help themselves to solve any issues or bugs that arose from development.
Worldwide Clinical Trials Inc.
UNIX Software Engineer Oct 2009 — Sep 2011
I was a co-business owner on a few of trials, this involved:
Liaising with projects managers directly from requirements gathering to the deployment of software.
Documenting work required: specification, alpha-tests and linking them to requirements.
Risk assessment of work using Good Automated Manufacturing Practice standards (GAMP5).
The entire codebase was bespoke and written in the C programming language. I learnt a lot from my co-workers about writing large-scale applications and the separations that should be present. This aided my move to being a core member of an R&D team aiming to provide a web-based Clinical Trial Management System (CTMS). Researching topics like:
Service Orientated Architecture - How we could integrate legacy and third-party systems (using ESBs).
Cloud Computing - How a private cloud would benefit the company.
Language Frameworks - PHP 4/5 (Zend), JavaScript (jQuery), Java (Spring).
Security - How to provide these services while protecting sponsors’ data.
Language Course Abroad Ltd
Web Developer Aug 2007 — Aug 2008
My placement year for my undergraduate degree at De Montfort University.
My core responsibilities were to:
Develop a bespoke booking system for their apartment block.
Maintain and develop their web infrastructure for advertising their language courses.
Liaise with in-house translators to translate web content for static websites.
All projects required a reasonable level of web security; this is where my interest in the subject began.
My work here involved the use of multiple versions of MySQL (4/5) and PHP (4/5), as well as some front-end development.
Language Summary
I am proficient in C, CPP, Java 7/8 (learning 9 as we speak), SQL, JavaScript (currently looking at TypeScript), PHP (4/5) and Python (2/3). I’m always open to learning new languages as no one language can do everything well!
I am currently learning Go to make a Github integration in my spare time.
Non-subject specific work experience
I have also previously been a purchase ledger clerk, a barman, and a sales assistant.
These roles gave me the time to interact with customers, clients and suppliers directly to sell or to query information to complete my duties.
University of Birmingham, Birmingham, United Kingdom
PhD in Computer Science Sep 2012 — Dec 2017
My research was primarily looking at how we can derive confidence in black-box processes using previous executions. We used traceability as a mechanism to see what was occurring within these black-boxes at runtime and used it as a basis for learning.
I used Python 2/3 and Java 7/8 to provide transformation engines that could give users confidence in a newly transformed source. It involved looking at and modifying alternative transformers to provide a comparison. Due to the nature of model-to-model transformation, it was essential to have an in-depth knowledge of generics, meta-modelling and reflection.
I was the year’s representative on the Staff/Research Students Consultative Committee (SRSCC) for my first and third years. Additionally, I was the representative for Teaching Assistants, on the Teaching Committee, for my third year.
Saxon, J.T., Bordbar, B. and Harrison, K., 2015. Introspecting for RSA Key Material to Assist Intrusion Detection. IEEE Cloud Computing, 2(5), pp.30-38.
Saxon, J.T., Bordbar, B. and Akehurst, D.H., 2015, July. Opening the black-box of model transformation. In European Conference on Modelling Foundations and Applications (pp. 171-186). Springer, Cham.
Saxon, J.T., Bordbar, B. and Harrison, K., 2015, March. Efficient Retrieval of Key Material for Inspecting Potentially Malicious Traffic in the Cloud. In Cloud Engineering (IC2E), 2015 IEEE International Conference on (pp. 155-164). IEEE.
Shaw, A.L., Bordbar, B., Saxon, J.T., Harrison, K. and Dalton, C.I., 2014, March. Forensic virtual machines: dynamic defence in the cloud via introspection. In Cloud Engineering (IC2E), 2014 IEEE International Conference on (pp. 303-310). IEEE.
MSc Computer Security Oct 2011 — Sep 2012
During my summer project, I developed a malformed network packet generation framework that allowed me to craft the necessary ARP packets required to perform a man-in-the-middle attack. My framework used JavaScript, C, and the foreign function interface to allow an easily craftable packet to be placed on a low level device.
De Montfort University, Leicester, United Kingdom
BSc Software Engineering Oct 2005 — Aug 2009
I was the first-year representative for the course.
My course included a year’s placement at Language Courses Abroad Ltd (see Experience).
My final year project involved transforming one programming language into another:
I had to learn two languages intimately to be able to do the transformation (Oberon-2 and Java).
This is where I got my interest in meta-programming and model-to-model transformation (using Haskell).
Throughout my studies I concentrated mostly on C/CPP and then built on that knowledge with Java and object orientation.
John T. Saxon © 2018
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Webcomics featuring Michael Lee
While Timothy struggles with this budding moral dilemma, let’s change scenes. We’re checking in that the STN-J headquarters. STN-J is the Japanese branch of Solomon, the global organization whose job is to hunt witches. Playing Space Invaders is not part of their job. But it’s after hours.
Webcomic CollectionsAnd Shine Heaven NowWebcomic Storylines37) But What If She Weighs Less Than A Duck?Webcomic CollectionsMichael Lee, Timothy Maccabee
But What If She Weighs Less Than A Duck? 35/111 published on 10 December 2007 Read more posts by the author of But What If She Weighs Less Than A Duck? 35/111, Erin Ptah1 Comment on But What If She Weighs Less Than A Duck? 35/111
There’s a reason why Michael isn’t allowed to leave HQ, but it’s not really plot-relevant. Pick up Witch Hunter Robin if you’re curious. Robin: Michael? Michael! Michael: Robin! You’re here late. Robin: So are you. Michael: Yeah, but I’m not allowed to leave, remember?
Webcomic CollectionsAnd Shine Heaven NowWebcomic Storylines37) But What If She Weighs Less Than A Duck?Webcomic CollectionsMichael Lee, Robin Sena
Robin: That monitor over there started beeping. I thought you might want to know. Michael: What does it say? Robin: “Event code 12.” Michael: That’s not helpful at all. Who wrote this program? Robin: Wasn’t it you? Michael: Yes. Yes, it was.
Michael: Ah, here we go. This is the subroutine that monitors airports. Robin: Airports? Michael: To see who’s entering Japan. Someone with the name Oscar Wiesenthal on the passport just flew in. Robin: Is Oscar Wiesenthal a witch? Michael: No. Oscar Wiesenthal doesn’t exist.
Heinkel doesn’t have any known aliases in canon, so I used a random Austrian name here. Robin: “Doesn’t exist”? I thought he just entered the country. Michael: No, someone with his name on a passport entered the country. “Oscar Wiesenthal” is a known alias of one of the Vatican’s agents. Real name Heinkel Wolfe. Age… Continue reading But What If She Weighs Less Than A Duck? 38/111
Michael: I’ll try to trace Heinkel’s movements. With the database, we can anticipate which witch the Vatican’s after. Robin: Why not let the church hunt this witch for us? We have more cases than we can handle already. Michael: You were raised Catholic, weren’t you? By a priest, even. Robin: That’s right. Michael: So you… Continue reading But What If She Weighs Less Than A Duck? 39/111
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The Owl's Legacy
A series by Chris Marker
Directed by enigmatic and brilliant documentary essayist Chris Marker, THE OWL’S LEGACY is an intellectually agile, engaging, and sometimes biting look at ancient Greece, its influences on Western culture—and how many eras have reinterpreted the Greek legacy to reflect their own needs.
Each of the 13 episodes is centered on a potent Greek word: from “democracy” and “philosophy” to “mythology” and “misogyny”. Marker convenes and films symposia—meals featuring wine and thoughtful conversation—in locales including Paris, Tokyo, Tbilisi, Berkeley and an olive grove on the outskirts of Athens. Footage from these banquets is interspersed with archival materials and interviews (often featuring a stylized or distorted owl image looming in the background). Marker’s diverse group of informants includes composers, politicians, classicists, historians, scientists, writers, filmmakers, and actors. Together their contributions form a compelling (and sometimes contradictory) cultural and historical exploration for each theme.
After screening on European television, THE OWL’S LEGACY was unavailable for decades—the result of objections from funders the Onassis Foundation, who took offense at comments made in the series about modern Greece. Now it has been restored and is finally being released. THE OWL’S LEGACY continues to serve as a powerful reminder of the ongoing impact of ancient Greek culture and the ways in which we continually recast it to suit our beliefs.
1. Symposium—or accepted ideas
“The wake of our dreams is Greek” --George Steiner
This episode sets the tone for the rest of the series, introducing the fundamental idea Marker and his participants explore: For centuries, we’ve used Greek civilization as a touchstone, but as John Winkler—classics scholar, queer historian, and one-time monk—says, looking at ancient Greece is like trying to determine what lies beneath a face covered in many layers of makeup.
The concept of the individual, calls to moderation, the value of knowing one’s self: classical Greek politics and culture have often been represented as models of rationality and order. But, as this episode makes clear, this is not because Greeks were particularly enlightened. On the contrary, order is the prize in a hard-fought battle against humanity’s dark, incestuous, and violent sides—as embodied in the story of Oedipus. Rather than embracing simple binaries, ancient Greece—like Oedipus standing at the spot where three roads meet, killing the man he will later learn is his father—embraced broader choices, including those that lead to the mysterious and unknown.
2. Olympics—or imaginary Greece
“Every European era has formed its own image of Greece made up from its own imagination. There is so much self-projection and misinterpretation.” -- Cornelius Castoriades
We begin with the personal. In interviews, classicists Manuela Smith and Oswyn Murray, singer Angélique Ionatos, and filmmaker Theo Angeolopoulos discuss the sometimes unconscious ways ancient Greek thought have permeated their lives and work. (And Ionatos notes that those who fetishize ancient Greece either idealize or ignore contemporary Greeks.)
From there, the episode looks at this phenomenon writ large—exploring the exploitation of ancient Greece to promote current ideology. As early as the 2ndcentury CE, the Church began recasting ancient Greeks as proto-Christians. But it was the German re-imagination that had the deepest—and most destructive—impact. The Nazis saw themselves as heirs to the Greeks. Against the backdrop of chilling footage from Leni Riefenstahl’s Olympia, this episode shows how philosophy, neo-Paganism and Greek aesthetic ideals were used to promote Nazi visions of purity, culminating in the displays of the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games.
3. Democracy—or the city of dreams
“Modern and ancient democracy have no genetic relationship” -- Mihalis Sakellariou
An in-depth—but not overly dense—exploration of how Athenian democracy worked, and the key ways it differs from modern states using the word. Ancient Greek democracy emphasized the polisnot as a city-state the way we understand it, but as a collection of individuals. Those able to participate (free men—a small minority of the total population) were passionate about politics and had access to numerous checks and balances. It was a world without parties, written policies, or an independent judiciary—one in which today’s decisions could constantly be revisited and refined tomorrow.
Book-ended by the 1968 pro-democracy protests in Athens against the ruling fascist junta, this episode paints a vivid picture of life in the first democracy. It also chronicles the unraveling of Athenian democracy during the three decades of the Peloponnesian War when, as Cornelius Castoriadis puts it, “The Athenian Demos degenerated. There was an oligarchic revolution... What the Demos lost was the art of making decisions. Even language was being corrupted.”
Athenian and contemporary Western democracies may be vastly different, but, as this episode clearly shows, they certainly do have parallels.
4. Nostalgia—or the impossible return
“It’s the most Greek word I know. In a sense, it defines Greece.” --Vassilis Vassilikos
Nostalgia is there right at the start of the Greek literary tradition. Odysseus, after a decade of fighting the Trojan War, must wander another decade before finally returning home to Ithaca. For millennia to follow, nostalgia—a word drawn from roots meaning “longing for home” and “pain”--continued to mark the Greek experience.
Greeks feel nostalgia on many levels and in many capacities. They are immigrants who idealize their homeland. Citizens of the contemporary world who feel a longing for and connection with the glories of the past (naming their children Electra, Diogenes, or Archimedes, for instance). And a people occupied by invaders for centuries, left wondering what remains of their culture. Modern Greeks take pride in the enormous influence the ancients have had on the Western world. But are they really, as George Steiner would notoriously have it, “a parody” of the past?
5. AMNESIA—or history on the march
Western history is said to begin with the Greeks—more specifically, with Herodotus, credited as the first historian. But the ancient Greek conception of history, based on the idea of self-examination, is very different from current conceptions. History in some ways is the interplay between remembering and forgetting—and it always being reconsidered and reimagined.
Located at the intersection of Asia, Europe, and Africa, Greece has long been a pawn in the games played by the great powers of the day, be they French, Russian, British, German, or American.
This episode, primarily featuring director Elia Kazan (with clips from his film America, America) and writer Vassilis Vassilikos, covers the “period of amnesia” in Greek history from the war of independence against the Ottomans to the overthrow of the junta and permanent exile of the king in the 1970s. It is a period filled with absurdities like a Bavarian child-king who spoke no Greek, alongside tragedies, including the Greek Civil War of 1947-1949, the massacre of the Greeks of Asia Minor, and the military coup of the Colonels.
6. MATHEMATICS—or The Empire Counts Back
“Historians say Utopia doesn’t exist. It does! It’s the geometric space where everything is proven.” --Michel Serres
There is a narrative about ancient Greece and math: That the Greeks invented mathematics as we know it, that men such as Pythagoras and Thales were its fathers, and that concepts including parallel lines and geometric shapes are universal and ahistorical.
After introducing us to this view, Marker sets about dismantling it—or at least questioning its universality and introducing much more uncertainty. Study of ancient Egyptian texts show mathematical concepts; algebra comes from the Arab world, and the nascent world of computing, artificial intelligence, and quantum mechanics are rooted in doubt and uncertainty.
Featuring fun math-themed animated segments, along with excerpts from a campy 1984 production in which a young woman in a dress that evokes ancient Greek style breathily explains mathematical concepts.
7. LOGOMACHY—or the dialect of the tribe
“The adventures of language may be the most meaningful thing in world history.” -- Nikos Svoronos
The word “logos” stands at the start of Greek philosophy. A word that defies simple translation, it lies at the root of terms including logic, dialogue, and dialectic. The Greek word for literature is “logotechnia” -- the technique of logos.
LOGOMACHY explores logos in its many forms, from Socratic dialogue and its implications when it comes to both education and power, to the five different forms the Greek language, to language as a battle in search for truth. The episode includes a discussion of Plato's Cratylus dialogue on the relationship between words and objects, and points to the next installment in the series, on a space beyond language: the realm of music.
8. MUSIC—or inner space
“The word was music before all else” -- Angelique Ionatos
What defines music? Soldiers marching in tandem create rhythms; Orthodox priests don’t simply speak when performing the liturgy, they chant and sometimes sing; the hammer banging on a board is not that different from the tug of a rope ringing a church bell.
In Greek mythology, Athena (whose symbol is the owl) invents music. This episode focuses primarily on composer Iannis Xenakis and singer Angelique Ionatos, as they delve into the multi-faceted natures of music, its intimate connection with the rhythms of the natural and human worlds, and the interface between technology, natural sound, and musical composition.
9. COSMOGONY—or the ways of the world
“Harmony can only be divine and it is Man... who makes it go berserk.” -- Iannis Xenakis
This episode is classic Chris Marker, tying together an abandoned Athenian power plant turned cultural center, ancient Greek statuary, a department store in Japan, young men destroyed by armored warfare during WWI, and a comparison between Plato’s parable of the cave and contemporary cinema.
From the beautiful enigmatic statues of Cycladic art to classic Greek statuary and on to the big bang theory, COSMOGONY explores the mysteries of creation—on the human, divine, and physical levels. It is no accident that in ancient Greek, the words for “poet” and “creator” are the same.
10. MYTHOLOGY—or lies like truth
“Myths fuel history.” --Mario Ploratis
A small number of Greek myths—Oedipus, Antigone, the Gorgon who turns people who gaze on her to stone—have fed our understandings of ourselves and each other through literature, religion, philosophy, and psychoanalysis.
In this episode, George Steiner discusses the origins of myth in the psyche, and speculates on the directions European history could have taken if a more Hellenic view of the world had dominated over the more Judaic approach of the apostle Paul. Meanwhile, in Japan, Atsushiko Yoshida points to strong affinities between Japanese religion and ancient Greek myths, and draws parallels between Shinto sites and Delphi.
11. MISOGYNY—or the snares of desire
“Greek love, Greek eroticism, is a paradigm for us. But it’s something about which we are very hypocritical.” --John Winkler
Classicist Giulia Sissa takes center stage in this episode, which explores desire in ancient Greece (primarily Athens), the social status of women, and the erasure of women by classics scholars.
Homosexual and heterosexual relationships co-existed, each within their own spheres. Any notions of romantic love resided with same-sex relationships, which were also seen as rites of passage for boys initiated into the ways of philosophy. Marriage was a different story—with the father as head of the household, and the mother akin to a child or subject. (Angelique Ionatos says she takes little comfort in the notion that a woman was queen within the household.) While the Greeks celebrated some forms of desire, they also recognized it as an omni-present and potentially powerful source of destruction.
12. TRAGEDY—or the illusion of death
“The institution of tragedy plays a fundamental role in a democracy.” --Cornelius Castoriadis
Greek tragedies were originally like TV shows before the age of streaming. They were performed once, and only once says scholar Oswyn Murray. But despite their transitory nature, they embraced themes that have spoken to humanity for centuries—and across cultures.
This episode looks at the particular cross-cultural pollination between Greek and Japanese theater. A Japanese woman remembers first engaging with Greece through Theo Angelopoulos’s film The Traveling Players, based on the myth of the House of Atreus. Angelopoulos and writer Vassilis Vassilikos find affinities between the rhythms of Noh, Kabuki, and classical Greek drama. Meanwhile, actor and theater director Alexis Minotis argues that in the modern world, only Greeks can truly understand the Greek tragedies—a position belied by the clips seen throughout the episode from a Japanese production of Medeaperformed in the ancient theater of Epidaurus, and lauded by Greek actor and Minister of Culture Melina Mercouri.
13. PHILOSOPHY—or the triumph of the owl
“The owl? What about it?” --Theo Angelopoulos
After a dozen episodes that begin and end with the image of an owl, PHILOSOPHY begins with the owl and its symbolism, and shows us how many of the participants in the series react to the birds or images of them.
What is philosophy? Does all philosophy draw on the Greeks? And are there any philosophers left? Kostas Axelos argues there have been no philosophers since Hegel; all we are left with now are thinkers. (Mind you, Axelos is considered by many to be a philosopher.) Cornelius Castoriades emphasizes that the Greeks had no fundamental sacred texts, while Guivi Margvelachvili emphatically argues precisely the opposite. And lest we find all this philosophical talk too abstract, much of this episode is filmed at a banquet in the Republic of Georgia, when that state was on the verge of declaring its independence from the Soviet Union—a time and place in which thought and action were closely linked.
“We should raze the Sorbonne and put Chris Marker in its place.” —Henri Michaux
“Glorius! Something for the ages; at once illuminating and confounding, heady but playful.” —J. Hoberman, The New York Times
"Enlightening, fascinating; a symposium of the mind. Marker's expansive, audiovisual sculpture to timeless knowledge [had been lost]; it's layered wisdom now soars again." —The Los Angeles Times
“It is talky, pedantic and adorable. I love it.” —ArtForum
“A testament to the extraordinary omnivorous mind of this defining film essayist.” —Film Comment
“The primary pleasure of the series, which is incredibly inspiring, is linked to this great banquet of participants, the sum of knowledge they invoke, but above all to the playful flows the editing establishes between their ideas, constructing a formidable network of meanings, historical and cultural perspectives - a veritable encyclopedia of development." —Le Monde
“Why did we have to wait so long for this electrifyingly intelligent film?” —Le Point
“Thirteen words to uncover an entire civilization and reestablish its considerable influence on our modern societies.” —Les Inrockuptibles
“With erudition, Chris Marker questions in each episode what remains Greek within us.” —Philosophie Magazine
“As absorbing as it gets.” —Time Out New York
“The best symposium on ancient Greece you'll ever sit in on.” —Chicago Reader
"Playful; Wide-ranging, wine-fueled... Delectations from an ancient Greek palate." —The Economist
French; Greek; English / English subtitles
For individual consumers (home video)
Home use Blu-Ray: $49.98
Home use DVD: $34.98
This DVD is sold for private, home use only.
This title is also available online from:
Historical Anthropology, Ancient Greece, Chris Marker, Philosophy, France, French Culture, French History, Cultural Studies, Film History
The Films of Chris Marker
Le Joli Mai
Chris Marker and Pierre Lhomme's legendary portrait of Paris and Parisians at the close of the Algerian war.
To Chris Marker, An Unsent Letter
A cinematic love letter to filmmaker Chris Marker.
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Difference between Debt & Equity
Equity & where to get it
Debt & where to get it
Government grants & where to get them
Glossary of Business Banking Terms
Ask theBankDoctor
Prospa, ASIC & the conundrum of Unfair Contract Terms law
Neil Slonim
Ethics, Fintechs
The aborted Prospa IPO raises questions not just about the online SME lender’s compliance with UCT but also ASIC’s role in applying and enforcing this law which came into effect in November 2016.
In its prospectus Prospa said “we have reviewed our loan contract in relation to UCT in July 2015 and again in September 2017. We will continue to review our loan contract as and when required in light of relevant case law and regulatory guides that may be issued”. Then the day before the IPO, Prospa received a letter from ASIC which is thought to have raised queries about whether its standard form contract contains clauses that may breach UCT.
Following a hastily arranged meeting with ASIC the following day, Prospa announced the IPO would be deferred for 48 hours. It said after this meeting “ASIC has been wonderful and very positive in their engagement” and the company felt “it does not need to make additional disclosures about its compliance with UCT regulations”. Prospa noted ASIC had not raised questions about the company’s disclosure or prospectus. And ASIC made no comment about what was in its 5th June letter or what was discussed or resolved at the meeting.
The IPO is now on hold yet we are none the wiser as to whether Prospa believes it is compliant or whether ASIC thinks Prospa may not be compliant. Until this uncertainty is cleared it’s hard to imagine how the IPO can proceed and in the meantime, ASIC’s collaborative approach to the application and enforcement of this law will come under closer scrutiny.
Prospa’s equivocal prospectus statement on UCT hasn’t helped its cause. It would be surprising if the Prospa directors did not seek and obtain written advice from their lawyers prior to signing off on the prospectus. Other fintechs that are not looking to list, have obtained written opinions from their lawyers stating their standard form contracts are UCT compliant.
Given the statement that it would “wait for case law or regulatory guides to inform it of any non-compliance with UCT” perhaps Prospa is of the view ASIC will tell them if it has contrary views and until or unless they receive input from ASIC nothing further is required?
There has been speculation ASIC’s last minute intervention may have been influenced by the Royal Commission’s questioning of ASIC’s Michael Sadaat on June 1st when counsel assisting Kenneth Hayne queried the collaborative approach adopted by ASIC and the Australian Small Business & Family Enterprise Ombudsman to get the big four banks to amend terms and conditions in their standard form contracts. At one stage, Mr Hayne asked Mr Sadaat “why say, in a media release, we will work with those who are not complying rather than saying, those who are not complying with the law should do so?”
In response, ASIC defended its approach saying that it “has been appropriate and moulded to addressing the risk of contravention of those provisions”. ASIC pointed out that since November 2016 it is has not initiated any legal action to enforce the law. This is more likely a reflection of ASIC’s priorities than the number of potential breaches. In addition, ASIC says it has received only one complaint about potential UCT concerns in a small business loan contract. The reason ASIC has received only one complaint is not that this is not a problem, it is because SMEs are not complaining. They are either too busy, don’t want to be exposed publicaly, don’t see any benefit for themselves or, as often as not, just don’t know ASIC is interested in their concerns.
In due course there is every likelihood the Royal Commission will make findings about the need for ASIC to tighten up enforcement of UCT laws particularly in the burgeoning non-bank SME lending market. But ASIC and lenders cannot and should not await the Royal Commission. SMEs who need access to funding offered by these lenders are entitled to know whether lenders comply with the law.
If Prospa believes its standard form contracts comply with UCT why doesn’t it just say so?. Similarly, if ASIC believes Prospa might not compliant why doesn’t it say so and then take whatever action it deems appropriate. Proving in court that a standard form contract term is unfair would not be easy although there are several clauses in Prospa’s standard form contract that, at the very least, raise questions about UCT compliance. These include:
1. Material Adverse Effects. Any event which in the lender’s reasonable opinion has had or may have a material adverse effect constitutes an event of default. Five types of events are defined as a Material Adverse Effect. They are not linked to non-payment. In such circumstances, no notice is required to demand repayment in full, use the direct debit authority as many times as the lender so desires or appoint a receiver.
2. Entire agreement. The loan agreement supersedes and overrides any other agreement, verbal or in writing.
3. Broad indemnification clauses. The loan agreement makes the borrower and any guarantors liable to the lender for losses, costs, liabilities and expenses suffered or incurred by the lender including, it seems, those that may arise outside the control of the borrower or guarantor.
4. Voluntary repayment. A borrower may at the discretion of the lender repay a loan early but this does not reduce the amount of interest payment unless the lender agrees. That is, if a borrower wants to repay early, they can be required to pay all the interest for the unexpired period of the loan.
This is not a “penalty” because the borrower accepts this clause when signing the loan agreement. Meanwhile in the Frequently Asked Questions section of the Prospa website, potential borrowers are advised, “there are no additional fees for early repayment”.
The voluntary repayment clause has caught out a number of unsuspecting borrowers. Last weekend’s AFR reported the case of a Perth based businessman with an existing Prospa loan who accepted an offer to borrow more but rather than simply increase the existing facility, Prospa sold him a second loan which was in part used to pay off the original loan. But despite paying that loan out early, the borrower says he was still required to pay the full interest and other fees as if the loan had run to its full term.
It may be that in recent times Prospa has made changes to its standard form contract although this seems unlikely given the prospectus states the last review was conducted in September 2017.
Compliance with UCT is an issue for the entire non-bank SME lending sector, not just fintechs or Prospa. But as the dominant player in the rapidly emerging fintech space, Prospa has an opportunity, arguably a responsibility, to demonstrate that fintechs can become a trusted alternative source of finance for the thousands of SMEs that cant get funding from banks. SMEs, who are generally time poor and financially unsophisticated, are entitled to expect that laws designed to protect them are enforced.
It remains unclear what the Prospa board and ASIC think about Prospa’s compliance with UCT law and until this is clarified, the cloud overhanging the company will persist and the IPO will remain in limbo. And hopefully ASIC will take the steps necessary to ensure UCT law is applied and enforced without unnecessary delay.
Interested in your comments.
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Notebook: SDSU football’s play-calling paradox and dominant defense
Chadd Cady
by Patrick Carr, Sports Editor
Coming into Satuday’s San Diego State football game against Fresno State, there was some focus on play calling. It wasn’t to the degree of last year, when Bob Toledo confused half the state of Texas with his illogical play calling.
Much of this year’s talk was centered around offensive coordinator Jeff Horton’s reliance on junior running back Donnel Pumphrey, despite having three capable running backs backing up Pumphrey.
The prevailing thought: Pumphrey’s going to get hurt.
He did.
Pumphrey limped off the field in the third quater with an apparent left ankle injury. He stayed on the sideline for several minutes while being guarded by a circle of teammates and team trainers before he walked gingerly to the locker room.
X-rays were negative on his left ankle. He has a high ankle sprain and could be out as much as four weeks.
“Hopefully it’s not more than a couple weeks,” head coach Rocky Long said. “It’s good news because when you see him limp off the field you have no idea what it is or how severe it is, he’ll recover naturally from an ankle sprain.”
Pumphrey had 23 carries for 124 yards and a touchdown before he left. He was used predominantly throughout the game, despite the stable of running backs SDSU possesses.
Senior running back Chase Price stepped in well for Pumphrey, running 27 times for 151 yards. Sophomore running back Rashaad Penny once again had an explosive game despite a small number of touches. He had two catches for 48 yards and a touchdown along with one rush for 17 yards.
Pumphrey returned to the sideline in the fourth quarter wearing street clothes with a boot on his left ankle, but Price shouldered the load in the second half, running straight at — and sometimes through — the defense.
Pumphrey’s workload has been high for a 5-foot-9, 170-pound running back. Against University of South Alabama two weeks ago, he had 28 carries while not one other running back had more than four. Most of those runs were up the middle, right into the teeth of the defense.
Play-action pass works wonders
On the other hand, Horton’s strategy of “Let’s run, baby!” seemed to do nothing for the play action pass initially.
SDSU started the game with 17 straight runs. Horton called a pass play after 15 straight runs, but the incomplete pass from graduate transfer quarterback Maxwell Smith was ruled off because of a penalty on Fresno State.
It was also by design, although maybe not the exact number of runs.
“That first drive was something much better than I anticipated it was going to be,” Long said. “That was pre-planned. Every play was going to be a running play…then taking it down and scoring I didn’t anticipate that to be honest with you. That was just an added bonus.”
Smith was sacked the next play while attempting a play-action. He then threw and completed his first pass two plays later on a six-yard throw to sophomore wideout Mikah Holder.
Later in the game, Smith made the Bulldogs’ defense bite on a 33-yard touchdown pass to an in-stride Penny.
“(The run heavy offense) definitely helps, and they bit hard on that one, and we were just waiting to run it and Penny was wide open,” Smith said. “Those are some of the toughest throws as quarterbacks because you see them wide open and you kind of want to aim it a little bit, but you’ve just got to let it go.”
In the fourth quarter, Smith delivered another dime, this one to junior wide receiver Eric Judge in stride for a 44-yard score to give the Aztecs a 21-7 lead.
Defense comes up huge
Lost in the attention given to Pumphrey’s injury was the SDSU defense’s dominant performance. It held the Bulldogs’ offense to just 89 yards and zero third-down conversions. They managed just 12 yards rushing on 22 runs.
Fresno State averaged just more than 0.5 yards per rush — 22 rushes for 12 yards as a team — while also punting 10 times. Sophomore quarterback Zach Greenlee, returning after serving a one-game suspension last week, threw for just 77 yards on 25 attempts (12 completions).
The Bulldogs were under pressure all night long, which took a lot of pressure of an Aztec defense that was plagued by long stretches on the field in its last three games.
“When the defensive line give their all, it makes the whole defense better, gives the linebackers holes to fill and the defensive backs easier coverage,” senior linebacker Jake Fely said.
Next up is the University of Hawaii on the road in Honolulu. The Rainbow Warriors lost 55-0 against Boise State on Saturday.
Tags: aztec football, donnel pumphrey, fresno state, mountain west football, rashaad penny, rocky long, San Diego State
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Aztecs topple CSUSM in final dress rehearsal, 80-42
[UPDATED]: Video of SDSUPD forcefully detaining man sparks campus demonstrations
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Home Entertainment Friv Games: the Newest Online Flash Game Provider
Friv Games: the Newest Online Flash Game Provider
Free Fun!
Friv games are awesome!
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The website uses cookies to keep track of the individual player’s gaming experience, in order to provide the player with more options and new games. The site also uses a voting system, with ratings of one to five stars for each game, so they can continue to add or take away games based on players’ feedback. They also keep track of the player’s favorite levels (indicated with a heart, of course!) so they can play them over and over again in the hours of time they are endeavoring to fill with addictive fun! As well as your playing history, Friv Games also keeps tabs on Most Popular Games, New Games, and Recommended Games based on your preferences. As with most websites nowadays, it has the option to connect to social networks for rating purposes, such as Facebook, Twitter and Google Plus.
With over seven hundred games, it is obvious that some exploring is necessary in order to experience all of them. However, Friv Games has grouped them into popular categories, so the player can get right into their game of whatever they feel like playing. The games include regular niches like adventure, 3D, action, educational, role-playing, puzzle solving, arcade, and cooking, as well as more specific categories like dress-up, avatar design, holiday-themed, and a few Disney characters. They also have several games based on popular movies or series, like Harry Potter, The Green Lantern, Deadpool, The Croods, The Flintstones, Phineas and Ferb, and Justice League, to name a selected few. While most of these games are single player games, they do have a few two-player games added. These flash games are designed to be fun, family-friendly, and easy to play, so get right in and get playing to experience as many as possible!
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Linden, Virginia
With the warming weather, Pawsome wine events are starting to sprout. Two of special note to Wine Dog fans this weekend.
Saturday, March 16, from 11-3, the Humane Society of Warren County is hosting a pet adoption event at Philip Carter Winery Word has it that they are bringing adoptable animals and baby bunnies will be on site. And PC will have crockpots with stews, soups and chilis to chase away the last of the winter blues.
Also on Saturnday, March 16, from 6-9, Barrel Oak Winery is hosting Barks & Barrels. This is the spring fundraiser for the Animal Welfare League of Arlington, which is celebrating its 75th Anniversary. Tickets include two complimentary drinks (wine or beer), an AWLA 75th anniversary "Paws off my wine" wine glass, delicious vegan snacks, and, best of all, the proceeds from each ticket sold will directly benefit animals in need at AWLA! Barrel Oak Winery will also donate 10% of all additional drink purchases to AWLA. Tickets can be purchased here.
Of course, just about every winery will be wearin' green this weekend.
Hope you find your Pot of GOld on the Wine Trail!
Posted by VA WINE DOGS at 10:53 PM 2 comments
Main Street Station
For the first time since the Virginia Governor's Cup Competition was revamped in 2012, a white wine has claimed Best in Show. Horton Vineyards' 2016 Petit Manseng bested over 500 wines from 102 wineries to earn the 2019 Governor's Cup.
The Horton Petit Manseng is 100 percent dry, finished with a touch of Viognier and Rkatsiteli (5 percent each) to produce an aromatic wine with intense flavors. The wine is modestly priced at $25.
Sharon Horton, who runs the agricultural side of the venture, called the entire team up to celebrate Horton's Governor's Cup Victory.
Horton Vineyards is one of the pioneers in the modern Virginia wine world, currently celebrating its 30th Anniversary. Founder Dennis Horton passed away last summer, but his legacy lives on in his wines and wines throughout the Commonwealth. It was Horton who brought Petit Manseng to Virginia in the late 1990s. He also is responsible for bringing Viognier (now the official state grape) to Virginia in 1989.
Caitlin, Shannon and Dennis Horton in 2017 with Virginia's signature Viognier, the only dry white to make the Governor's Cup Case that year.
Two other pillars of the Virginia wine industry also were honored at the Governor's Cup Gala. Mitzi Batterson of James River Cellars was recognized as the 2019 Virginia Wineries Association Wine Person of the Year. Batterson is a former President of the Virginia Wineries Association and has been a leader in revamping the Governor’s Cup Competition and starting the Virginia Wine Co-op.
Mitzi Batterson of James River Cellars receives the Wine Person of the Year award from Justin Rose (Rosemont of Virginia), President of the Virginia Wineries Association.
The Gordon Murchie Lifetime Achievement Award went to Jim Corcoran of Corcoran Vineyards and Cidery (Wine Dogs Ecco and Pomeroy had a wonderful visit to Corcoran in 2014). Corcoran was instrumental in creation of the Virginia Wine Distribution Company and has chaired the Virginia Wine Council. Since 2010 he has served on the Loudoun County Chamber Board of Directors, representing the Virginia Wine Industry in the county that today boasts the largest number of wineries in Virginia.
Jim Corcoran receives the Gordon Murchie Lifetime Achievement Award from Wine Board Chairman Kirk Wiles (Paradise Springs Winery),
All 68 Gold Medal wines from the competition were showcased at the Gala, with special recognition given to the top 12 (including the Horton Petit Manseng), which will comprise this year's Governor's Cup Case. Read about them here.
Sharon Horton shares a Governor's Cup moment with York, who was well into his cups by the Gala ended.
Posted by VA WINE DOGS at 7:26 PM 0 comments
Representatives of the nine wineries in the Governor's Cup Case await Governor Ralph Northam's announcement of the winner of the 2019 Governor's Cup.
With upwards of 300 wineries in Virginia, sniffing out the cream of the crop is no easy task, even for the most seasoned Wine Dog. Virginia’s Governor’s Cup Competition assembles a distinguished panel of judges under the direction of Master of Wine Jay Youmans to help shine a spotlight on the top-producers in the industry and on emerging trends. A Wine Dogs “paws up” to each of the nine wineries whose 12 wines make up the Governor's Cup Case this year.
York (serving as stunt double for Ecco at the Governor's Cup Gala) consults with Jay Youmans, judging director for the 2019 Virginia Govenror's Cup Competition.
A few observations from this year’s case. Red blends continue to be palate pleasers. This year’s top Reds include six blends (with Merlot the dominant grape in five of them), along with a Cabernet Franc and a Tannat. Petit Manseng is living up to expectations as a rising star in Virginia, claiming two spots in the case as a pure varietal (including the Governor’s Cup winner from Horton) and a third spot as the base of a desert wine. Vermentino rounds out the case.
The man with the golden touch, Michael Shaps (Virginia Wineworks), with a view of his gold medal winners.
As noted in an earlier post, Michael Shaps has become King of the Golds in Virginia. He crafted five of the wines in the case (and 22 of the 68 gold medal winners), including wines for case first-timers Hamlet and Upper Shirley.
If you are looking to sample Virginia's finest, follow the Wine Dogs' lead and put these on your list.
Barboursville Vineyards earned four golds this year, claiming a spot in the case with the 2017 Vermentino Reserve, which the Wine Dogs predict will be a fabulous summer sipper.
Barboursville’s associate winemaker Daniele Tessora treats York to tastes of Barboursville’s golden wines, including the signature Meritage blend, Octagon (the 2009 vintage won the Governor's cup in 2013).
Early Mountain Vineyards blended Merlot from some of its oldest vines with Petit Verdot for the case-winning 2016 Eluvium, one of the winery’s four gold-medal winners.
Early Mountain General Manager Dave Kostelnik and Associate Winemaker/Vitaculturist Maya Hood White let York compare the 2016 Eluvium to the 2015 vintage, a repeat gold medal winner which also made the case last year.
Glen Manor Vineyards claimed a spot in the case for its 2015 Cabernet Franc (the most planted red grape in the Commonwealth and a Wine Dog favorite) and brought home gold for the 2015 St. Ruth. Glen Manor won the Governor’s Cup in 2012 for its 2009 Hodder Hill Red blend.
Glen Manor owner and winemaker Jeff White shares a taste of the 2015 Cabernet Franc with York.
Horton Vineyards chose to make a completely dry Petit Manseng from its 2016 vintage, earning its first-ever Governor’s Cup for the effort. Founder Dennis Horton helped introduce Petit Manseng to Virginia. Read the Wine Dog report here.
Horton’s Gilta Sekhri and Josh Sabatrinic can’t wait for the Wine Dogs to visit - and show off their wines.
King Family Vineyards claimed two spots in the case this year for Red blends –the 2016 Mountain Plains and the 2016 Meritage. The 2014 Meritage won the Governor’s Cup last year.
York congratulates King Family Winemaker Matthieu Finot on an impressive two wines in the case and four gold medals in the competition.
Fairfax County’s only winery, Paradise Springs in Clifton, produced an outstanding Meritage from four of the Bordeaux noble varieties, leading with Petit Verdot.
Paradise Springs’ Yorkie-loving founder Jane Kincheloe serves York a taste of the Meritage on a silver platter.
New to the case this year is Hamlet Vineyards in Martinsville. The 2016 Eltham is a blend of Merlot and Petit Verdot produced by Michael Shaps. That the wine’s name is an anagram for the winery is purely coincidental.
“This is what I was meant to do,” owner Virginia Hamlet says of her conversion from architecture to wine. Hamlet is dog friendly and features a vineyard dog, Enzo.
The Governor’s Cup Case includes three wines under the Michael Shaps label – the 2016 Petit Manseng, the 2015 Tannat, and the 2016 Raisin d’Etre (the Petit Manseng that forms the wine’s base was air-dried in tobacco barns, essentially “raisining” the grapes, thus the name).
York photobombs Michael Shaps in conversation. The man with the golden touch may be shy about standing with dogs but stands behind his wines.
Completing the case is a second newcomer and another member of the Michael Shaps stable, Upper Shirley Vineyards in Charles City, with the 2014 Zachariah.
The Upper Shirley team, led by Tayloe and Susie Dameron (center), were bubbling over with excitement when they met York at Old City Bar before the Gala and continued celebrating all night.
We are days away from learning who will win the 2019 Virginia Governor's Cup. What we do know is that 68 wines earned gold in the competition. This year's spirited competition included 510 wines from 102 Virginia wineries. For a full list of medal winners, click here.
Paws up to Winemaker Michael Shaps whose Virginia Wine Works made nearly one-third (22) of the golden wines under his own label and for other wineries. Shaps purchased Shenandoah Vineyards, Virginia's second-oldest winery, in November. He believes the Shenandoah Valley has the state’s best grape growing potential and has thus far been under the radar.
Michael Shaps continues to be King of the Golds, besting his 2018 performance with 22 winning wines.
For the present, Central Virginia continues to dominate the competition, and Barboursville, Early Mountain, King Family, and Trump Winery each brought four golds back home to the region.
The Wine Dogs will be reporting from the scene next Tuesday night to let you know who wins the cup and who makes the case this year.
68 Virginia Wines Strike Gold in the Governor's Cu...
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I AM MARK MACPHAIL (END OF WATCH: AUGUST 19, 1989)
INTERNET SOURCE: https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/post/troy-davis-guilty-as-charged/2011/03/04/gIQAh23BoK_blog.html?utm_term=.c6dcac5479e3
Troy Davis: guilty as charged
By Charles Lane September 22, 2011
Troy Davis’ execution is nothing to celebrate. The only satisfaction it offers, if any, is the grim kind that comes from knowing a killer got his just deserts.
Of course, to opponents of the death penalty, every execution is an outrage. Davis’ supporters say this one is worse: the deliberate state killing of a man despite evidence that he is innocent.
If they’re right, Georgia and all of America should be ashamed.
But they’re wrong: Troy Davis is guilty.
How can I be so sure? After all, former President Jimmy Carter, Pope Benedict XVI, and former FBI director William Sessions backed Davis. Prosecution witnesses have recanted their testimony; scant physical evidence tied Davis to the crime.
But it’s one thing to argue your case in the court of public opinion; it’s quite another to do so in a real court, with sworn testimony offered and cross-examined by both sides.
And when Davis had that opportunity, in a special hearing last year ordered by the Supreme Court, the judge rejected his claim, declaring flatly that “Davis is not innocent.”
This saga began the night of August 19, 1989, in Savannah, Georgia. Police officer Mark MacPhail, moonlighting as a Burger King security guard, rushed to break up a mugging in the parking lot. When the ensuing clash ended, MacPhail lay mortally wounded by gunfire.
A number of witnesses identified Davis as the man who stood over MacPhail and fired twice before fleeing. Based on that testimony, a jury of seven blacks and five whites convicted him and sentenced him to death in 1991.
Davis admitted being at the scene; but he insisted that someone else pulled the trigger. In the years since his 1991 trial, he has submitted affidavits from seven witnesses who inculpated him at trial but later said their testimony was either mistaken or coerced by the police.
Davis’ appeals, state and federal, failed – until August 2009, when the Supreme Court handed him a dramatic victory. Citing a “substantial risk of putting an innocent man to death,” the court overrode usual limits on death-penalty appeals, granted a stay of execution and ordered a federal court in Georgia to weigh Davis’ evidence of innocence.
Chief Judge William T. Moore of the U.S. District Court in Savannah, an appointee of President Bill Clinton, convened the hearing in June 2010 -- whereupon Davis’ case crumbled. Much of his “new” evidence had already been heard by the original trial jury. Some of his witnesses fared badly on cross-examination, while prosecution testimony stood up.
Davis’ lawyers declined to put two of Davis’ purported recanting witnesses on the stand, though they were available – one even waited outside the courtroom. Judge Moore quite logically found these omissions “suspicious.”
Davis’ lawyers did not call the “real” shooter; nor did Davis, with his life on the line, testify. Perhaps this reflected his experience at trial, where he told his story to the jury, and the jury did not believe it.
In August 2010, Moore issued a 174-page ruling, in which he picked apart Davis’ factual claims one by one, concluding, “The vast majority of the evidence at trial remains intact.”
Davis’ supporters say Moore unfairly required Davis to present “clear and convincing” proof of innocence, a high standard. But Moore’s emphatic findings implied Davis’s case wouldn’t have passed any test; it was, the judge wrote, “largely smoke and mirrors.”
I believe Moore because he is an impartial authority who reviewed all the evidence in an appropriate forum – and for whom a ruling against Davis was not necessarily the path of least resistance. No one in Moore’s position would want an innocent man’s death on his conscience if he could avoid it at all. The Supreme Court’s unprecedented intervention signaled it wanted federal courts to go the extra mile to avoid a wrongful execution. Certainly Moore would have been a judicial hero in many quarters if he set Davis free.
But Moore did what he thought was right -- and the Supreme Court, in deference to the judge’s mastery of the facts and law, unanimously declined Mr. Davis’ appeals in March.
The Davis case does raise legitimate questions. Should authorities have even sought the death penalty in this case? Though undeniably senseless and cruel, the murder of Mark MacPhail was an unplanned act against a single victim. As I have argued elsewhere, such offenses do not rank among the special crimes – mass murders, for example, or terrorism – for which the death penalty should be reserved.
Among its other benefits, limiting the death penalty more strictly to the “worst of the worst” would shrink the risk of executing an innocent man.
PLEASE GO TO THESE THREE BLOG POSTS TO HONOR THIS FALLEN COP:
http://victimsfamiliesforthedeathpenalty.blogspot.com.au/2012/08/i-am-mark-macphail-died-on-19-august.html
http://victimsfamiliesforthedeathpenalty.blogspot.com.au/2012/08/i-am-mark-macphail-died-on-19-august_19.html
http://angrywhitedude.com/2011/10/i-am-mark-macphail-troy-davis-is-burning-in-hell/
Labels: Death Penalty For Cop Killers, Fallen Police, Innocence Fraud
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